Occupy Santa Rosa Plans
for Spring Gathering
Celebration of 6-month anniversary will include music, family activities and a parade
On Saturday, April 7th, at 1:00pm, Occupy Santa Rosa (OSR) will hold a large gathering in Courthouse Square called the “Spring Awakening.” Participants will celebrate six months of working in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street movement by mobilizing everyone who has been a part of OSR in one way or another since its inception in October of last year. Together, Occupy Santa Rosa participants and their allies will launch the 99% movement into the warmer months.
The event will include live music, kids activities, an egg-hunt, speakers, a "Parade for the 99%", and a large "General Assembly," which is the decision-making body for the movement.
All of the work we have been doing over the winter – in Working Groups, in Affinity Groups, and with allies in the community – will be made visible.
1:00pm – Rally and Festival with music, speakers, egg-hunt and “Kids General Assembly”
2:20pm – Parade for the 99% with puppets, marching bands, clowns and more
3:00pm – General Assembly. Get familiar with our decision-making process, which invites all to participate and be heard equally. Help us build the movement and guide its path to success.
4:00pm – “Rockupy!” More live music to celebrate the 99% and launch ourselves into a powerful Spring Awakening of the movement!
Get ready, get excited, get democracy! Join us!
“Occupy Santa Rosa is still here,” says Tandava Kandiah, “and we are only getting stronger.”
Since the eviction of their encampment at City Hall, OSR has persisted and grown - joining the campaign to end corporate personhood, launching an effort to establish a public bank, creating an Occupy SRJC group, building up efforts to end poverty and the criminalization of homelessness, and organizing solidarity actions with teachers, students, and immigrants' rights organizations. OSR is also planning to join the national call for a “General Strike/Day without the 99%” on May 1, International Workers’ Day.
The Occupy movement remains urgent and relevant, despite government and media repression. "Rich people will let your family starve so that they can have more money," states OSR participant Newman Strawbridge. Economic issues are still at the forefront of Occupy work, and will continue to be as long as corporate interests dominate the government, and as long as the 1% steals wealth from working people.
