[mgj-announce] June 26, 2002 MGJ Meeting Notes

[Adam Eidinger]

MGJ General Meeting 6-26-2002.  If you Didn't come, its cool.  The next
meeting is TUESDAY, July 2 7:30 Pm at St. Stephens Church (A
confirmation email will be sent out.) We Want you!
------------------------------
Presentation by Debbie Handrahan of the DC Statehood Green Party on the
U.S. Olympic Committee visit to DC this Saturday.  Protests are planned
for Sat. June 29th at 12 noon at the The Wilson Building, 1350 Penn
Ave., NW
Reasons to oppose the Olympics coming to DC:
Any permanent improvement for the games i.e. roads, bridges, stadiums,
etc. are paid for with local tax dollars.
Real costs of games never factored when economic impact is discussed.
Low and moderate income housing will be lost and replaced with luxury
housing, especially near the Olympic site.  The USOC is not accountable
to the local or federal government, but rather only International
Olympic Committee.  Senator Stevens wrote a law on the issue.
Over 10,000 people lost their homes when the Olympics came there and it
cost the city over $1 billion.
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IMF World Bank Protest Date Discussion
No decisions were made.  Ideas were very diverse.  We do have a general
call for the dates Sept 25- Oct 3.  Pros of making weekend main day
center on larger expected turnout, cons are it undermines impact of
direct action or no business as usual approach ACC has adopted.  Could
result in small numbers during WB/IMF meetings on Oct1-2

Preliminary schedule of protests we know about and World Bank.IMF plans
Thurs - Sept 26 - Immigrants Rights march - Amnesty for Undocumented
workers
Sat - Sept 28 - G8 meeting (some people support having this be the main
day, bringing in the largest numbers)
Sun - Sept 29 - Non-Violence trainings (suggested)  Some suggested
making this the main day of action
Mon - Sept 30 - Anti Capitalist Convergence suggested making this a day
off to prepare for Citizen Strike on Oct 1
Tue - Oct 1 - First day of IMF/World Bank general meetings and ACC
Citizen Strike
Wed - Oct 2 - Second day of meetings
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Mark Cimeno suggested a communication working group that would create a
citywide calendar and searchable online database.  the web site is
called Timed Alliances and could be useful in checking other events
already planned.  Mark will continue to work on it. (Mark please send
out an email when you are finished)
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Fifth Demand Discussion
Mike S. suggested we add a fifth demand to the MGJ call to action that
calls on the U.S. to unilaterally end the war on terrorism and repeal
the USA Patriot act. Discussion ranged from total support of the new
demand to caution because we could make many other demands and our
mission statement already has references to militarism.  Some said we
should ad mention of the abuse of racial profiling under the USA Patriot
act and others had different ideas.  A subcommittee was formed to hash
out the 5th demand.
------------------------------------
Outreach Working Groups
There was consensus that we need more groups and people organizing for
the fall WB.IMF protests.  Suggestions included more literature, tabling
around the city, direct outreach to key allies like MGOs Labor, Enviros,
Womens' groups, local community orgs.  Let the community lead us in what
projects we get involved in, like the Olympics.  We hope to have a round
table discussion of groups interested in planning the protests this
fall.  We broke up into working groups.

Outreach Groups we Formed - Plus Contacts (Tom M - Please put this  info
on the Website Asap)

Labor Outreach    Martin Thomas  202-332-6558 thomasm at seiu.org
Latin American Solidarity Groups Hendrik 202-234-3440 hvoss at soaw.org
Women's Groups Christy 202-882-9649 capardew at yahoo.com
DC Social Forum Mark Cimino 202-271-7990 markgcimino at yahoo.com
General Outreach (all groups) Crystal Sylvia 202 421-8596
crystalsylvia at yahoo.com
Arts (Puppets, Props) Nadine Bloch 301-891-3680 nbloch at igc.org
Musicians Adam Eidinger 202-986-6186 adam at mintwood.com












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