Background: Ann Lockwood is the owner of a modest East Hillside home. She walks with a prosthetic leg after a major medical crisis that also cost her a good-paying job. Ann is now at risk of losing her home to foreclosure by State Farm Bank, even though she is working again and able make consistent mortgage payments.
Please join us on Monday, MLK Day, at 10am to send this message from our community to State Farm: 1. cancel the sheriff’s sale of Ann’s home, and 2. provide Ann with a fixed-rate loan modification she can afford. Gather at 8th St and 7th Ave E, then march to the Washington Center to join the main MLK Day celebration.
This kind of people power is saving homes across the country, and we aim to do the same for our neighbors in Duluth.
What: Save Ann’s Home — March for housing rights
When: Monday, January 16, 10 to 11 a.m.
Where: Meet at the corner of 8th St & 7th Av E, march to the Washington Center
Who: Project Save Our Homes, Loaves & Fishes Community, Minnesotans for a Fair Economy, and hillside neighbors
More on Facebook, and check here for a complete listing of MLK weekend events.
TIME Magazine’s 2002 Person of the Year and FBI whistleblower Coleen Rowley will be in Duluth tomorrow for 2 events:
At noon on the steps of the Duluth Federal Building, she’ll headline a Stand with Brad! rally to support accused Wikileaks whistleblower Pfc. Bradley Manning. The 23-year old Army intelligence specialist is facing brutal pre-trial punishment at Quantico for allegedly leaking information about war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan.
At 7:30pm in the Mitchell Auditorium at St Scholastica, Rowley will deliver the final lecture of the school’s Terrorism and Human Rights series, on the topic of Obama’s Response to Terrorism. Free and open to the public.
From the Burmese jungle to coal mining towns in West Virginia, Training for Change (TFC) has for decades worked alongside grassroots activists to help them build more effective movements. This November 12-14, TFC is bringing its popular Training for Social Action Trainers (TSAT) to Duluth.
The TSAT is meant for activists, educators and organizers of all stripes who want to take their movement-building skills to a new level. Using experiential tools and small group discussion, the TSAT covers everything from workshop design to confronting racism. I highly recommend this training… but space is limited and filling quickly.
The fee is on a sliding scale ($150-$300) and includes all meals. Please don’t let cost be an obstacle: scholarships are available. Check out the Training for Change website for more details and to register.
Minnesota native Andrew Turpening has lived in Cuba and studied Afro-Cuban music at the National School of Arts in Havana. He’s pulled together some equally talented friends for a little benefit for the Pastors for Peace aid caravan/blockade challenge to Cuba. Expect Cuban standards (think Buena Vista Social Club), a little classic Argentinian music, and dance…
The Northland Anti-War Coalition is collecting donations of tools and building materials for Cuba as part of a nationwide challenge to the 50-year US blockade. The aid will help ongoing efforts to rebuild some 500,000 homes damaged during the 2008 hurricane season; and send a collective statement against Washington’s cruel and failed Cuba policy.
Provided our aid isn’t seized by US border agents, it will be received and distributed by a non-governmental council of Cuban religious leaders.
Pastors for Peace, the group sponsoring the blockade challenge, will visit Duluth on July 6. Between now and then, you can leave donations at the Duluth Labor Temple (2002 London Road) or Peace Church (1111 N 11th Ave E). We can use almost any new or gently used carpentry, plumbing, electrical, and masonry tools/supplies, as well as new safety equipment (dust masks, etc). You can check out a complete needs list and details here.
Coleen Rowley, you may remember, was the veteran FBI agent who blew the whistle on pre-9/11 intelligence failures and tried to warn the Bush Administration against the war in Iraq. She’s retired from the FBI now, but still working for a more transparent and ethical government.
If you miss her at the rally, she’ll be giving a public lecture that same evening at UMD, 7:30pm in Room 120 of the Solon Campus Center.
A coalition of student activists from LSC, UMD and CSS have called for an anti-war protest in Duluth on Thursday, the day President Obama is scheduled to receive his Nobel Peace Prize. “You’ve got your prize, now earn it!” is the theme… they’ll be calling out the new Nobel Laureate on escalating the war in Afghanistan, as well as his recent decisions to launch more drone attacks inside Pakistan and station hundreds of US troops on the other side of the globe in Colombia.
No dreary speakers at this protest, just a little noise and fun street theater. Meet up at 4:30 PM at Lake and Superior in front of the Christmas… um, Holiday tree. Bring drums or buckets to bang on, and reflective clothes if you’ve got ‘em for safety’s sake. And be ready to take it to the streets.
Last year, NASA’s James Hansen issued a devastating report on climate change, concluding that any amount of CO2 in the atmosphere above 350 parts per million (ppm) is not compatible “with a planet upon which civilization developed, or to which life on Earth has adapted.” Problem is, we’re already at 389ppm and rising.
If we don’t reverse course fast, we’re toast.
October 24 will see the largest international coordinated climate action in history – 4,000 events in 174 countries and Antarctica – all putting pressure on world leaders to take bold action to address the crisis at their December climate talks in Copenhagen, and get back under 350.
350.org is collecting photos of all of these events to present to the UN. Help us make a good showing in the Twin Ports.
The rally kicks off tomorrow at 3:00pm on the Harbor side of the DECC. Bike if you can, because after a couple speakers police chief Gordon Ramsay and the anarchists down at the Bike Cave are going to lead a group ride through Canal Park (there’s a walking/kiddie route, too). We’ll meet back up at exactly 3:50 for a big group photo at Endion Beach (I don’t know what else to call it… the armpit of the lake? Y’know, the rocky beach behind the Canal Park “Lodge”).
If you’re up for more fun, check out today’s waltz-in at 4. More details on everything at 350twinports.wordpress.com.
Join Mayor Don Ness, Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer and hundreds of others in Duluth on October 24 as we celebrate pedal power and take action against global warming.
Rally and Ride (or Walk) for Climate Protection
Saturday, October 24 / International Day of Climate Action
3:00pm: Gather on Harbor Dr behind the DECC for a mini-rally and big group bike ride through Canal Park – costumes and noisemakers encouraged. No bike? There will also be a pedestrian march, complete with brass band.
4:00pm: Climate teach-in (details TBA).
In December, world leaders will meet in Copenhagen to craft a new global treaty to cut greenhouse gas emissions. While many climate scientists are calling for immediate action to reduce CO2 in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million or less (we’re now at about 385ppm), the treaty currently on the table doesn’t pass that test.
Get your monster on and support Nukewatch with DJ Focus. 10pm. Come as your favorite mutant or biologist. The bar is mixing up glowing martinis, and we’ll have a toxic barrel photo booth and prizes for most creative, most realistic and most uncomfortable costumes. Freewill donations at the door will help Nukewatch raise hell about the military waste in Lake Superior.
Pastors for Peace are on their way to Cuba again to bust the U.S. blockade. They’ll either deliver 100s of tons of needed aid to the island, or land in prison.
Come on out to Lafayette Community Center on the Point this Tuesday, July 7 to send them off and shake your salsa thang.
6PM Cuban dinner (veggie) and a speaker on the Cuban health care system
7:30PM salsa lessons with Juliana Bertelsen… then we dance
Come for all or part of the evening. Cash donations for the caravan taken at the door. It’ll be fun. And humanitarian. Can’t beat that.
