To Coalition to Preserve Community members and others interested: 11/24/07
ALL OUT THIS MONDAY (11/26/07) TO PROTEST THE CITY PLANNING VOTE WHICH WILL
BE HELD AT 1:00PM AT 22 READE STREET. IT WILL BE HELD IN SPECTER HALL, A SMALL
ROOM WHICH COLUMBIA ALWAYS FILLS WITH ALL ITS EMPLOYEES TO KEEP THE COMMUNITY
OUT. PLEASE COME OUT BY 11:30AM TO GET A SEAT. THE COALITION TO PRESERVE
COMMUNITY WILL HOLD A PRESS CONFERENCE AFTER THE VOTE. READ CHAIR BURDEN'S
COMMENTS BELOW, AND OUR COMMENTS AND COME OUT AND SPEAK UP.
(1) This Monday, Nov. 26th, at 1:00PM, the City Planning Commissioners will
cast their votes against the Harlem community in favor of powerful Columbia.
Even before the Final Environmental Impact Statement had been released, Chair
Amanda Burden announced the Commission's (and the Mayor's) position as she read
the Department Recommendations Opening Statement at the CPC Review Session if
the CB 9 197-a Plan and Columbia University Proposal held on11/13/07. We
have pasted in the entire statement at bottom of this E-mail, and have excerpted
and commented on some of it a directly below:
From Burden's 11/13/07 statement:
"The Commission has been guided by the principle that both should be reviewed
simultaneously and that each should be afforded equal treatment in the
process."
Coalition to Preserve Community comment:
Saying Harlem got "equal treatment" in this process is like telling us that
BP Stringer did not sell out the community when he failed to support the
Community Board's 32 to 2 vote against Columbia and cut his deal to support its
eviction plan. They are paving the way for displacement, eminent domain,
environmental hazards from the bathtub to bio-level #3 labs, and the elimination of a
diverse community.
Burden:
"It is important to note that at the end of its ULURP review period,
Community Board 9 significantly revised its plan by increasing the
community facility FAR to the same FAR as proposed by Columbia, and by
eliminating the ground floor requirement for manufacturing uses. As
discussed at our October 29 Review Session that development under the
revised 197-a plan would therefore result in an area predominantly
devoted to Columbia University. As a result, we no longer have before
us two radically different visions of land use in Manhattanville, but
instead two different visions of how Columbia can, and should grow in
Manhattanville."
Coalition to Preserve Community comment:
So even with all the compromises that CB 9 offered in the last few weeks, the
City only supports the all or nothing concept. Burden and the Commission give
lip service to the 197A Community Plan, and then think that the peasants up
in the low income, "minority" neighborhood will sit back and accept their
double talk!
Burden:
"The 197a plan, on the other hand, would not permit this concentration
of uses, missing an important opportunity to transform and activate
125th Street as a connector between the upland neighborhoods and the
waterfront and precluding the range and scale of open spaces made
possible by the Columbia plan."
Coalition to Preserve Community comment:
Well the conflicts of interest of City Planning Commissioners are clear so it
is no wonder why the Commission is handing over 17 plus acres to Columbia. We
have called for Cantor, Knuckles and Williams to recuse themselves from
voting on Manhattanville issues, but the fact is that the whole system is rigged
in favor of the real estate industry and that means Columbia. Burden literally
did not even wait for the final impact statement to be released before she
announced that the fix was in! The nerve of Burden to make claims that the
Columbia plan allows for an integration of uses. This is an all or nothing, eminent
domain driven, eviction plan which will cause massive displacement. Columbia
wants to use eminent domain against other entities besides the private property
owners so it can avoid other lengthy processes which could occur with the MTA
and other corporate owners. City Planning is not planning, it is
participating in evicting.
Burden:
"On balance, the two plans before us are very strong but as I said earlier,
differ fundamentally in their visions of how Columbia can and should grow in
Manhattanville."
Coalition to Preserve Community comment:
And the priority always is the entity with the power and the millions spent
on lobbying has certainly paid off for Columbia. At its heart this is a
decision based on race and class, and no amount of spinning by Burden, the Mayor, all
Columbia's politicians and lobbyists, or other compromisers can avoid the
ugly racism and classism behind this land grab. They all want to avoid the issue
of eminent domain, but it is not going to go away, and neither are the folks
who will be sitting in front of the bulldozers after this "equal treatment"
ULURP process reaches its conclusion.
WE KNOW MONDAY IS A WORK DAY, BUT DO YOUR BEST TO COME OUT THIS MONDAY.
Monday Demo Against Expansion
It's not just Columbia, it's capitalism!
Now that students have won the bulk of their immediate curricular reforms, it's time to turn the tide of struggle and get it behind Harlem's working class to fight back against Columbia's racist, anti-worker expansion. We must broaden and sharpen the struggle on all fronts!
In order to do this, students must continue to get a better grasp of the nature of the expansion. This first means understanding Columbia's history of working-class displacement. Additionally, students must go into this battle with the understanding that no matter what concessions we manage to wrestle from Columbia about curriculum or expansion are at best a temporary fix, not a solution. Our struggle will be in vain if we fail to see that no reforms or concessions will fundamentally alter Columbia's racist, imperialist nature. Beyond Columbia, and US colleges in general, such reforms will not change the racist, imperialist nature of the US or the capitalist class its government and universities serve. Indeed, to give the struggle meaning, it must be always growing. Not just numerically, but in the scope of its demands, and even more importantly, the scope of its political outlook.
At the end of the day, the problem's not just Columbia, it's capitalism! Capitalism, not CU's administration, is the system that encourages, supports, allows, and legally protects Columbia's "right" to push working-class residents out of their homes and neighborhoods. Capitalism, not CU's administration, is the monstrosity that systematically devalues the lives of all workers, especially "national" or "racial" minorities. Capitalism, not CU's administration, is what makes the dollar and profits all-mighty; and capitalism, not CU's administration, is what makes one dollar or a million of them worth more than a "lowly" worker's life.
Imagine you are a doctor. An HIV-positive patient comes in with a case of pneumonia. Now, which is the real root problem--the HIV or the pneumonia? Sure, the penumonia's bad, but the HIV is what systematically disarmed the patient's immune system, opening the door to a whole host of diseases; diseases that, while normally are highly treatable, in a patient with HIV can be life-threatening. Capitalism is the disease. Columbia is merely an outgrowth of it. Poverty, unemployment, war, racism, sexism, workfare, racist cops, and Columbia's expansion effort are only the symptoms.
Of course, we want to alleviate the symptoms (in this case, displacement of 5,000 residents, mass job loss, etc.). But we won't be doing the patient much good if that's the only thing on which our efforts are focused; if we're not attacking the disease itself. The difference between HIV and capitalism is that right now, both could be prevented, but only one of them can be cured. Sure, we have to fight Columbia's expansion, even if it's only a stop-gap measure. But we need to broaden and use this reform struggle as a school for communism, to raise the political and class consciousness of students and workers. Then we can make sure the struggle doesn't end in vain, and build our strength, unity, and organization to wipe away the entire profit system.
Lucha organizes "Immigration Week" on campus
11/12/07 -- Lucha, one of the groups central to taking on the Minuteklan last year on campus, kicked off its Immigration Week events tonight with a candlelight vigil at 9pm. The event, scheduled to coincide with the nightly 9pm vigils in support of the student hunger strikers, drew a sizable crowd of at least 100 people, despite the cold and rain.
Many students, faculty and others spoke, make demands ranging from reform of core curriculum to include more ethnic studies, to more radical calls to oppose conservative and liberal immigration policies alike. One young speaker identified himself as an undocumented immigrant, and told the crowd of how he learned just recently that after repeated appeals, his remaining immediate family in the US was now going to be deported.
PLP handed out leaflets about opposing anti-immigrant racism, and copies of Challenge-Desafio. One PLer also took a turn on the microphone, introduced himself as a student, member of PL and the international working class, and a proud Communist, stating that "the capitalists, conservative and liberal, want to pave the way to wider wars, bigger profits, and increasing fascism--and they're going to do it with the dead bodies of thousands of immigrant workers and their children."
He stressed that workers of all "races" need to unite to smash the whole rotten, capitalist system. "How long will we wait [until we finally get rid of the entire system] while we fight for breadcrumbs from these capitalist parasites?" After saluting Lucha for organizing the event, as well as the hunger strikers whose tents were close by, the comrade ended with the chant, "smash racist deportations, working people have no nations!"
While the politics at the event ranged from the predictably nationalist--there were several invocations of the Young Lords, as well as one former member present--to the more openly revolutionary, PLP raised sharp political points and the event energetic and moving.
Lucha will be hosting a series of events throughout the course of the week, including speakers and film showings. A particularly important event, on Wednesday from 12-4pm at Low Plaza, will be about the DREAM Act--which Lucha supports in their literature. PLP believes it is critical that all working people oppose this proposed legislation designed to stave off a real return of the draft by creating a back-door draft for undocumented immigrant youth wishing to gain US citizenship. The act offers a college education track to citizenship as well, however, only 1 in 20 youth would be eligible for the higher education option. The rest would simply be sent to fight and die in oil war after oil war. Supporting the DREAM Act is a fatal error and plays directly into the hands of reactionary forces of war and developing fascism.
Harlem workers, college students march against Columbia's racist expansion
(Pictured: Students speak out against Columbia's racist expansion and core curriculum in front of university president Lee Bollinger's residence.) 11/10/07 -- "Harlem: not for sale! Hunger strikers: not for sale! Our homes: not for sale! Our jobs: not for sale!" These were a few of the chants that filled the air as a multiracial crowd of 250 angry community members, students, faculty, and organizers marched on Columbia's main campus and Lee Bollinger's house.
By 12:30 in the afternoon, a throng of protesters had gathered on the steps to Low Library. One speaker after another, ranging from community organizers to student hunger strikers, spoke out in rage and indignation at Columbia's racist effort to expand northward into Harlem, displacing 5,000 black, Latin, and white working-class residents. Students in particular were also protesting Columbia's Eurocentric core curriculum and demanding more ethnic studies programs. The speeches were in English and Spanish, and a palpable energy filled the crowd.
After rallying for perhaps 30 minutes, everyone marched from the Columbia campus over to the house of its president, Lee Bollinger, to the rhythm of a radical marching band from Brooklyn. Unfortunately it was reported that Bollinger was not home, but the crowd rallied for another 30 minute in front of his residence and heard the demands of community members not to be displaced or to have a hazardous biological agent research facility near their homes. More student organizers and hunger strikers raised their voices on the megaphone about Columbia's broader place within a long history of brutal American imperialism and exploitation, even drawing connections to the manifest destiny policy responsible for the displacement and genocide of millions of American Indians. One pointed out it was the very nature of the profit system that made Columbia not give a rat's ass about workers and students.
PLP members and friends took part in the march, made several new contacts from Columbia, Hunter, and City College, and distributed every single copy of Challenge/Desafio we had with us. Unfortunately, we had a limited supply to begin with and did not anticipate the large size of the demonstration, so this only amounted to 50 copies. However, black and Latin workers eagerly grabbed copies out of our hands faster than we could keep up. Some other marchers remarked they had not seen PL in 40 years. One said "Hey, is that Challenge? Give me a copy!" and went on to explain that PL was one of the first political groups he had ever become involved with when, in 1968, he was a Columbia student taking part in the big strike.
We also helped distribute leaflets from various community organizers PL Columbia students have begun working with, that pointed out the utterly racist nature of Columbia's actions and of its very nature as an institution.
There will be another mass protest on December 1st, and we have been busy working with other student organizers on campus as well to provide support to the hunger strikers. We are also struggling to raise these issues in the graduate schools, which for the most part are less involved or aware of a lot of the issues surrounding the hunger strike than the undergraduate students. There is a lot of work to be done, and a long road ahead regardless of the final outcome of the hunger strike itself.
We are dedicated to supporting the masses of students and community members in their demands, and to struggling with them in a comradely fashion over the internal contradictions between reform and revolution--and the necessity of the latter. The students at Columbia are doing big and bold things worthy of much praise, especially the hunger strikers who are putting their health, wellbeing, and lives on the line. But students in PL must help forge and understanding amongst the broader student body that without this developing movement receiving leadership from the multiracial masses of workers in Harlem--and not vice-versa--student activists will ultimately set themselves up for failure.
The fate of the student demands and the Harlem community are bound up together, but only when the student body unites behind Harlem's working class, rather than in front of it, will victory in the immediate struggle be a possibility. And more importantly, only when the students of the world unite behind the workers and soldiers of the world can we smash this whole brutal racist profit system and replace it with one where we give according to our commitment, and receive according to our need: the bright future of communism!