WNYPC Annual Mtg Sat 2-5; Poor People’s Campaign Updates; plus

Written by Victoria Ross on May 17, 2018. Posted in Economic Justice, Resist Militarism!, Talking Peace News, Urgent Appeal

Dear Friends!            716-332-3904; 716-931-3520         5/17/18

Please join us for the WNYPC’s Annual Membership Meeting this Saturday, 2-5pm, here at 1272 Delaware Ave (entrance & pkg round back of bldg). No worries snack-luck (means bring snacks/beverages to share if you like, if not convenient don’t let that stop your coming!). Come share in celebrating our great year during the onslaught, and some exciting plans for the future! Si, se puede!
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The historic Poor People’s Campaign is going beautifully!

The Monday kick-off went wonderfully well!! Many thanks to Kirk, Dennice, CEJ generally and the so many who worked and went! Turnout was good at ~450-500 people, and those who risked arrest were not even arrested!

This Sunday, 5/20 – 5:15-8pm Watch Party at Raqs (Thanks, Eve!!) 322 Amherst St. Debrief from Monday’s trip and watch Rev Barber and all livestreaming. Potluck.

This Monday 5/21 Virginia McIntyre is going on and looking to carpool (2 cars possible). Anyone who want to join can email her at vlmcintyre@outlook.com. Also they could register here for that week Click here to join us next Monday for Week 2 in Albany!

Tues, May 22 Nonviolent Direct Action Training – Poor People’s Campaign @ 5:00 pm – 8:00 pm Come on out for shared learning of the principles, spirit, and practices for Nonviolent Direct Action training, especially for the Poor People’s Campaign and it’s 40 days of action to run starting Mothers’ Day. At Rafi Greene CAO Masten Resource Center, 1423 Fillmore Ave, Buffalo. Please register/RSVP: at 716-332-3904; or office@wnypeace.org. also see the Facebook

Tues, May 29 Bus to Albany, leaving at 3:45 from UB South Park & Ride. Stand against Militarism and the War Economy, and for Education. Coming back midnight or later if need be, waiting til those who risked arrest are free. Link – when available – will be on PPC-WNY FB page and the website and fb page of WNY Peace Center. You can let us know in the office (332-3904; office@wnypeace.org) to make a reservation.

As for June 4-5, we are mostly likely having some kind of bus trip tbd: could be an overnight, could include stops or not. To help us with the planning (Thanks, Kevin) Here’s a link to the Doodle poll “Day(s) of Action in Albany, NY June 4th and/or 5th 2018”  https://doodle.com/poll/766qy7u82abc66z3 to help estimate how many will attend Monday, June 4th NYS PPC Day of Action “The Right to Health and a Healthy Planet: Ecological Devastation and Health Care” AND stay over for Tuesday, June 5^th “Statewide Lobby Day & Rally for the New York Health Act”

June 11 & 18 in Albany, and June 23 in DC are still tbd.

Watch for our Watch Party that will include a re-launch of the #LoveisLove Campaign, Date tbd!

Just a little snapshot of the many things going on with this campaign. We look forward to our PPC-WNY next planning meeting MAY 24, 5pm, 1272 Delaware Ave (entrance & pkg round back).
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Please note the Global Days of Listening with the Afghan Peace Volunteers on Monday, March For Gaza on Friday (4pm at Niagara Square), and more ….

Don’t forget too to register if you’re interested in University, Community, & Gov’t Partnerships, R- Weds-Fri June 13-15: Rose Bente Lee Ostapenko Ctr for Race, Equality & Mission; Niagara University niagara.edu/niagara-university-partnerships-for-race-and-equality/. Stacey Smith and Vicki Ross do a workshop on the Friday, comparing and contrasting different ways peace and justice advocates relate to the police force in particular and/or government in general.

#UnitetheStruggles

Many Thanks, Peace, Solidarity, and yes Love.

See our website including calendar for more details, as well as additional postings of our Weekly News homepage post:

#unitethestruggles

Peace, Thanks, Solidarity, Justice, and yes Love.

#PowerWITH-NOTPowerOver

Remember to tune in: DEMOCRACY NOW! IS NOW BEING BROADCAST MONDAY-FRIDAY, 8AM-9AM (LIVE) ON WBNY 91.3FM. Hear it over the radio or streaming live at wbny.buffalostate.edu or http://tunein.com/radio/WBNY-913-s27549/.

Below are
– more event listings (see also calendar & facebook page);
– Taskforce items and campaigns; and
– regularly scheduled events – all in that order.
And be sure to go to wnypeace.org/calendar for more event listings – there’s plenty more and additions are frequent! …..

No hate, no fear as we are #StillResisting.  #UnitetheStruggles !
Peace, Thanks, Solidarity, and yes Love.    #loveisloveBUF   <3

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EVENT LISTINGS

A District Community Police Meeting

May 18 @ 10:00 am – 11:00 am

This is a chance for community members to meet with the district chief and community police officers with the Buffalo Police Department. “A” District 1847 South Park Avenue

Reception: Celebrate WNYPC, IPN, and V Ross (awarded honorary doctorate)

May 18 @ 3:00 pm – 5:00 pm

Come out to the WNYPC/NRC to celebrate our Beloved Community’s being recognized by Vicki Ross being awarded an honorary doctorate by Medaille College. No worries snack-luck. At WNYPC/NRC Bldg, 1272 Delaware Ave (entrance and parking around back of building). All are welcome!

WNY Peace Center Annual Membership Mtg

May 19 @ 2:00 pm – 5:00 pm

Come out to review the year and share our visions, campaigns, and efforts for the future. At WNYPC (NRC Bldg, 1272 Delaware Ave, entrance & pkg round back of bldg). No worries potluck. All are welcome, tho only members can vote. Another world is possible! Crisis ~=Opportunity

“Stop the Killing” School Gun Violence Forum

May 22 @ 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm

At Buffalo Academy of Science Charter School (190 Franklin St, Buffalo 14202).

Nonviolent Direct Action Training – Poor People’s Campaign

May 22 @ 5:00 pm – 8:00 pm

Come on out for shared learning of the principles, spirit, and practices for Nonviolent Direct Action training, especially for the Poor People’s Campaign and it’s 40 days of action to run starting Mothers’ Day. At Rafi Greene CAO Masten Resource Center, 1423 Fillmore Ave, Buffalo. Please register/RSVP: at 716-332-3904; or office@wnypeace.org. also see the Facebook

Perspectives on What Works in Public Education

May 23 @ 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm

At The Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural Site, 641 Delaware Avenue, Buffalo NY 14202. Panel discussion with expert educators Sherry M. Cleary, Executive Director, NewYork Early Childhood Professional Development Institute David Mauricio, Chief of Strategic Alignment and Innovation, Buffalo Public Schools John Starkey, Principal, Lafayette International High School Wendy Paterson, Dean, School of Education, Buffalo State College

March For Gaza

May 25 @ 4:00 pm – 5:30 pm

Palestinian Rights are Human Rights! Stop the killing and human rights abuses by the Israeli Government and Military, aided and abetted by the US Government. Brings Sign! March route tbd.

Honest and Effective Conversations about Race

May 26 @ 1:00 pm – 4:00 pm

Free workshop by African American writer Nanette D. Massey. At the Unitarian Universalist Church of Buffalo, Elmwood and West Ferry. How many of us avoid having candid conversations about race with people because we are uncomfortable? Massey believes the answer to that question is: too many of us, and unnecessarily.

For more info, please go to our WNYPC calendar
TASKFORCE ITEMS AND CAMPAIGNS

ECONOMIC JUSTICE TASKFORCE

Join the Poor People’s Campaign – WNY. See above, as well as  wnypeace.org/current-campaigns and  NYS Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival

Please call our state senators to ask them to support The New York Health Act, the bill to guarantee health care to all New Yorkers, passed the NY State Assembly for the third consecutive year in 2017. Call now to help #PassNYHealth in the State Senate. Contact info is on our website
wnypeace.org/governmental-contact-info/). Learn more nyhcampaign.org

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EDUCATION & HUMAN RIGHTS TASKFORCE

PEACEJAM is at Lafayette HS Community School Saturdays 10:30-11:30am, May 19 – the last day for now! Come for an Inspiration, Education, and Action Celebration. All are welcome.

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ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE TASKFORCE

The West Valley Nuclear Site’s comment period was extended to May 25. Please request full clean-up (and repeat as necessary/feasible)! Go to wnypeace.org/environmental-justice/  or

https://www.addup.org/campaigns/west-valley-deserves-a-full-clean-up—comment-on-the-seis-today

For more info, you can contact Lia Oprea, WECAP, Cell: 310-770-3288
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New York Renews is taking another trip to Albany on May 8,

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No Nuclear Waste over the Peace Bridge

April 27 @ 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm

Join us every Friday from 2 PM to 3 PM at the corner of Busti Ave and Vermont St. in Buffalo NY. Vigil against the shipment of high level LIQUID radioactive spent fuel from Chalk River Ontario to Aiken South Carolina. If any of it spills out, it will be next to impossible to clean.
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Action Alert re Stone Dam Road Pipeline: go to wnypeace.org/environmental-justice/

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GENDER JUSTICE TASKFORCE

If you believe that discrimination against all women should be eliminated, please support enacting the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in the city of Buffalo. Follow this link for more information: https://cities4cedaw-buffalo.org/ and contact your district’s councilperson to urge them to support this ordinance too.
Darius G. Pridgen- Ellicott District- 716-851-4980
Christopher P. Scanlon- South District- 716-851-5169
David A. Rivera- Niagara District- 716-851-5125
Joel P. Feroleto- Delaware District- 716-851-5155
Richard A. Fontana- Lovejoy District- 716-851- 5151
David A. Franczyk- Fillmore District- 716-851-4138
Joseph Golombek, Jr.- North District- 716-851-5116
Ulysees O. Wingo, Sr.- Masten District- 716-851-5145
Rasheed Wyatt- University District- 716-851-5165
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IMMIGRANT & REFUGEE JUSTICE TASKFORCE

Calls are still needed to your NYS Assembly Members to ask them to support NYS ASSEMBLY Bill #4050. The GreenLight NY program restores access to drivers’ licenses to all community members, to avoid abusive immigration enforcement.  For more info, please come out to above mentioned event, or go to
https://www.facebook.com/GreenLightNY/; Green Light Petition

Vive la Casa, shelter for people awaiting documents and/or sanctuary, still desperately needs personal hygiene products and of course, CASH.
jrchc.org/vive
(Checks to Jericho Road/VIVE) 50 Wyoming St., Buffalo, NY 14211, 892-4354.

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LATIN AMERICAN SOLIDARITY COMMITTEE (LASC)

Great celebration and inspiration from our friends Honduran Musicians/Activists Karla Lara & Jose Antonio! Many thanks to all who came out! The musicians are part of a country wide tour sponsored by Witness For Peace, an organization that supported a peaceful resolution to the many civil wars in Central America. The event will honor Berta Caceres, human rights advocate who recently in 2016, was assassinated.

CONGRATULATIONS TO BILL JUNGELS and CHRISTINE EBER!!!
The Las Cruces International Film Festival bestowed its “Best Feature

Documentary” award on Maya Faces in a Smoking Mirror, a feature length documentary directed by Bill Jungels, Co-Produced by Bill Jungels and Christine Eber and shot in Chiapas, Mexico. The documentary looks at how young Mayas are preserving or recovering their Maya identity and resisting the global forces that threaten this identity. Just as preserving native seed stocks helps us all survive in a world of vulnerable monocultures, the preservation and adaptation of traditional human cultures offers us all models that may help us survive as a species. The documentarypremiered in September of 2017 at Hallwalls.

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As you know, people desperately need our help because of the continuing devastation caused by “natural” disasters (read fossil-fuel-burning-generated Climate Catastrophe) as well as other factors. You can contribute as follows:
Puerto Rico—Go to hispanicheritagewny.org for a full report on ways to help.
We also recommend:

Mutual Aid Community Soup Kitchens Paypal address:  cdpecpr@gmail.com run by Giovanni Roberto, friend of MaryAnne Grady Flores (UpstateDroneAction.org and Puerto Rico activist].

The Mariafund.org is another fund governed by many grassroots community groups.
Cuba—Alliance for Global Justice/Irma Relief, 418 W. 145th St.. New York, NY 10031 (for tax deductible). Not tax deductible, IFCO/Irma Relief (same address) Phone: 212-926-5757                   Please give generously – the situations continue to be terrible for many!!

Chenalhó, Chiapas—Humanitarian crisis
This article in the National Catholic reporter gives a brief overview of the situation.
https://www.ncronline.org/news/world/enough-deaths-mexican-clergy-reiterate-chiapas-crisis

If you would like to help, go to weaving-for-justice.org

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PRISONER’S RIGHTS TASKFORCE

Please join us in promoting the H.A.L.T. Solitary Confinement campaign. Please call your State Senators and Congresspersons and ask them to cosponsor and vote for the bills A. 3080 / S. 4784.
Ways you can help:
RSVP for the upcoming Advocacy Day, March 13, to demand passage of the HALT Solitary Confinement Act: https://goo.gl/z22oVf

Sign the petition to support the HALT Solitary Confinement Act: https://goo.gl/HLwqbK

Encourage your organization to endorse the HALT Solitary Confinement Act: https://goo.gl/forms/FM2F6DZAcPZp1co32

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RACIAL JUSTICE TASKFORCE

The Radical King Book Club Meeting

May 30- @ 7:00 pm – 8:30 pm

At Tri-Main Bldg (Suite 547, 2495 Main St, Buffalo 14214). Join The Radical King Book Club Meeting to discuss the book The Radical King by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (Author), Cornel West (Editor). “The radical King was a democratic socialist who sided with poor and working people in the class struggle taking place in capitalist societies.”

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THE CARIOL HORNE WHISTLEBLOWER FUND
The Western New York Peace Center has created a fund for the purpose of supporting police officers who face reprisals from their department from choosing to strictly uphold their oath to protect and serve the community.  gofundme.com/cariol-horne-whistleblower-fund. The Peace Center has named this fund after Cariol Horne who saved the life of a citizen, but was fired just prior to earning her 20-year pension.  Our goal is to encourage good police officers in following their moral conscience if and when it conflicts with the infamous blue wall of silence.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_wall_of_silence
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Join the #BuffaloLLEP movement. It’s easy.

Join the hundreds of Buffalonians who make up the #BuffaloLLEP movement, asking Mayor Byron Brown to make low-level marijuana arrests Buffalo’s lowest level enforcement priority (LLEP).
People across the U.S. recognize what a destructive failure the 40-year “war on drugs” has been. In Buffalo, the news hasn’t sunken in yet, though, as those living in communities of color & low-income areas are still disproportionately targeted by law enforcement for marijuana arrests. Join the #BuffaloLLEP movement to stop these unfair & harmful enforcement tactics!
Learn more.
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Each Police District has a Chief and Community Police Meeting. We encourage people to go to them and communicate freely on issues of concern. See wnypeace.org calendar for listings.

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RESIST MILITARISM! TASKFORCE

Please call your Senators and Congresspersons to urge them to vote in favor and cosponsor if possible Senator Markey’s Bill # 200 and House Bill, Rep Lieu # 669, to Restrict First Strike with Nuclear Weapons.

If you’d prefer to send an email to your senators, you can do so here.

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Our tax dollars are funding massive civilian casualties and the world’s largest humanitarian crisis in Yemen. The U.S. military is providing midair refueling to warplanes, sharing intelligence for targeting assistance, and selling U.S. bombs to the aggressors. U.S.-supported airstrikes target schools, hospitals, and water and sanitation infrastructure. As a result, millions of Yemeni people are on the brink of starvation and are facing the fastest-growing cholera crisis ever documented.

Every day that the war on Yemen continues, America is complicit in aiding war crimes. Call your U.S. Senators today at 1-833-786-7927 and urge them to stop fueling war on Yemen!

Please let us know if you’d like to be involved with our Infringement Festival activities which will be focused on Yemen. We’d love to have your help. Please call Russell Brown 716-570-5200 or email Marie Schuster mariemschuster@gmail.com.
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REGULARLY SCHEDULED EVENTS in the One Movement, One Struggle

Riverside-Salem UCC/DC Sunday. Progressive program followed by potluck. Sundays, 4-7pm. Environmental Cottage, 3449 West River Road, Grand Island. This Sunday – Work Day.

Talking Peace with the WNY Peace Center Radio Show on 91.3FM, WBNY. Mondays, 1-3pm. Jim Anderson & Vicki Ross co-hosting. Call-in show! Go to wbny.buffalostate.edu or http://tunein.com/radio/WBNY-913-s27549/.

Buffalo Supports Standing Rock Water Protectors/Nekanesakt. Indigenous support group/allies. 1st and 3rd Tuesdays of the month, 6:30-8pm. At Burning Books, 420 CT Ave. All are welcome!!

Interfaith Peace Network
1^st and 3^rd Thursdays of the month, breakfast pot-luck **9:30-11am**, NRC, 1272 Delaware Ave, Buffalo NY 14209 (entrance and parking round back).

Environmental Justice Taskforce
Protest the Shipments of VERY Dangerous Radioactive Liquid from Canada.
Fridays 2-3pm, Front Park, Buffalo. Email Charley Bowman renewableenergy@wnypeace.org with your phone number for him to call and let you know whether (weather 😉 the vigil will take place that particular Friday. Or just show up and bring your own sign if you’re not sure others will be there!!

Fridays – 1st and 3rd of the month; 6pm: Stop The Violence Coalition,
United Way Building, Delaware and Summer Sts.

Saturdays, Noon-1pm: Women In Black. Nonviolence vigil, Bidwell and Elmwood. Signs also available. (and you don’t need to be a woman or dress in black 😉

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More listings on website (wnypeace.org) and in previous email posts.
To subscribe, write to weeklynews@wnypeace.org with “subscribe” in subject line.
To unsubscribe, write to weeklynews@wnypeace.org with “unsubscribe” in subject line.

(Sorry for occasional delays!)

Please submit possible listings for consideration to weeklynews@wnypeace.org.
Many thanks, peace, solidarity, and yes – Love. We shall overcome!!