New York, Nov. 25 -
Pinal County Greens today joined 2009 Green Party candidate for New York City mayor Reverend Billy Talen and community groups for the takeover of a Bank of America ATM branch in Manhattan to protest the bank's foreclosure policies. Here is a report and photos by Richard Grayson, Pinal County Greens co-chair.
Early this afternoon -- Black Friday to some, Buy Nothing Day to others -- we joined with the New York City community groups Reverend Billy & The Stop Shopping Choir and Picture the Homeless for a protest action at the Bank of America branch at the corner of Houston and Lafayette Streets.
On this day when so many around us were shopping, we occupied the bank in the heart of chic, fashionable SoHo (okay, technically just over the border of NoHo) to sing and pray and have a dinner, courtesy of the kitchen of Occupy Wall Street, in honor of Kendall Jackman, who just two years ago was living an ordinary life renting a brownstone in Brooklyn but who today is homeless, the victim of one of millions of home foreclosures across the country.
We walked over from our organizing point at the corner of Crosby and Jersey Street, across from the Housing Works Bookstore Cafe, around 1 p.m. with chairs, a table, dishware, silverware, the delicious dinners, and two nice paintings donated by the late Kurt Vonnegut and Reverend Billy Talen to make Kendall feel at home in the bank which foreclosed on her landlord and forced her to leave the still-unoccupied building that BofA foreclosed upon.
For us, the most moving part of the creative protest was when Reverend Billy & The Choir sang their beautiful song "We are the 99%" (as we gather together)."
Afterwards the group returned to Zuccotti Park, where a group from Occupy Wall Street remain to fight the good fight. We learned a lot about organizing public demonstrations during the preparations for today's action and were impressed with the dedication and shrewdness of Billy Talen and his New York City community group. We hope to take what we've learned in New York during #OWS actions back to Arizona with us for action in the coming year.
The Pinal County Greens are members of the Arizona Green Party in Pinal County.
