Notes from the

Occupy Delaware

General Assembly (GA)

Open Forum Meeting

2012-04-28

Spencer Plaza, Wilmington

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Bank of America’s share price has plunged into the single digits,

and the bank faces battles in courtrooms all over America

to avoid paying back the hundreds of billions it stole from everyone in sight.

Its credit rating, already downgraded to a few rungs above junk status, could plummet with the next bad analyst report,

causing a frenzied rush to the exits by creditors, investors and stockholders –

an institutional run on the bank.

They’re in deep trouble, but they won’t die,

because our current president, like the last one,

apparently believes it’s better to project a false image of financial soundness

than to allow one of our oligarchic banks to collapse under the weight of its own corruption.

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Meeting started: 1510 hr
GA at DiMeos on Market St.

5 copies of the latest letter from the city, the letter was read.

(There will be an Op-Ed in the News Journal Monday. It’s really good.)

The most significant line of the lawyer’s letter is the last. Our lawyer, Morse, is not sure what he’ll do. Any speculation here or otherwise is just that.

We are legally advised to not discuss openly this issue.

Schedule a Monday night meeting?

Jurisprudence, they have their way of handling things.

Coordinating with firedoglake on bank sleep and National Gathering…

Anyone who wants on or off the list of names the city’s lawyer asked for see Jen (the list saying you are part of the GA). This list is at least of names of people who can be contacted to represent the GA. No one is to be contacting Chancery Court, lawyers, etc. Let the lawyers mediate.

It might be reasonable to increase site security to minimize likelihood of incidents that may inflame the situation.

By what we did today at the site, it’s all positive, looks like a protest site, showing good faith. We’ve always been very cooperative and there are more people in city government for us then against us. Everything we’ve done is a positive. We’ve already achieved a lot of our goals. Occupy Delaware is not going anywhere.

We’ve complied with every request of the city and with the agreement.

What we’ve seen with other Occupy sites on the east coast…

Rev. Tom Davis has come forward and said we’re consecrating Peter Spencer’s memory. He’s also been in contact with the ACLU.

Let’s use the camp as it’s supposed to be used. Everyday there’s something at the site, a movie, a dinner, a lecture, something. [twinkle fingers all around]

Bus trip May 1. We need to have a presence, especially on May 1 at Spencer Plaza. Contact Ray if you decide to stay on site instead of going to NY. There are Occ Philly and Baltimore going to NY.

A lot of Occ Philly may be coming to Spencer now.

People from New Haven are available to come down. We were at New Haven for all three of their evictions.

People who come down to the site need to bring their own tents.

ACLU will take care of all fees that may be incurred. Everyone is encouraged to donate to the ACLU.

Would additional letters to the editor be potentially damaging to our case, legally? The only things counciled against are things that could interfere with legal tactics.

The law is not as transparent as we are. The facts are still the facts, the argument to not show your hand is great because it gives them less lead, but the facts remain.

Temperature check is against putting the GA rebuttal lettter up on the site. We can get our message out as individuals. It’s important for people to see there is general support for the movement.

Write all the personal opinion letters you want, and comments in the comment section of the News Journal letters to the editor.

This is an opportunity to describe to the public who we are and what we do. E.g., the garden project. Highlight the positives to the press.

The city has clearly communicated that they hate homeless people and that is dispicable to me. They don’t care about the citizens who need them most.

Some of the positive things we have done, Green Friday, Meals served to homeless…

Re the garden, I spoke to Beverly Bovell today from the Bovell for Mayor campaign. The parcel was purchased in 1996 and forfeited to the city after 7 years of neglect. They still will participate in the May 5 Community Day and beyond. We got the two raised beds built and schlepped all the compost. The gardners are thrilled with it. So for May 5 we need to clear out trash and weeds, and do fence repair, and put in mulch. We’ll put a strip of flowers around the edge. The owner of the property adjacent to the lot has given her permission to put a mural on the wall! We’re open to all info for that, artists, funding. So far we’ve laid out $170, which needs to be reimbursed. We may get $300 from Sammy Prado. To build a new fence will be around $700. The day we were moving the soil onto the site we got a lot of interested people saying they’ll help on May 5.

Can we repurpose the pallets on the site to green fencing for the garden? Maybe 2 or 3 for additional planting, but not for fencing. The neighborhood has problems with theft and vandalism so security is needed. Also any opaque fencing would block too much light. We could put the pallets at the ends of the site, decorative and useful in terms of growing space. Vertical gardening.

Talk about how we’re welcoming to homeless people, looking to help them rather than be concerned about what they might do. We weren’t condemning people for their problems, we are inclusive, friendly. We gave them a place to stay, what else could we humanely do? The homeless are people, not objects.

Meeting Monday, 7 pm at Spencer Plaza.

Meeting adj: 1615 hr to return to sprucing up the site.