This week, residents of the Santa Cruz area joined the thousands of people participating in Occupy Wall Street events throughout the nation.
Occupy Wall Street is a series of demonstrations that began in New York City last month as a way to oppose a laundry list of entities and problems — from the bank collapse to the federal reserve, the economic recession, capitalism and many more. Using the slogan “We are the 99 percent,” the movement has galvanized people around the country.
Inspired by the thousands of people participating in Occupy Wall Street, similar events have cropped up around the nation, in hundreds of U.S. cities. Protests are being/have been held in By 7 October, similar demonstrations had been held in Boston, Chicago (where the Board of Trade was unimpressed,) San Francisco, Los Angeles, Tampa, Sacramento, Salt Lake City, Houston, San Jose and Washington, D.C., among dozens of others. On Oct. 15, protests are expected in at least 25 cities outside the U.S., from Hong Kong to Buenos Aires and Madrid.
On Tuesday, Occupy Santa Cruz was born. On Thursday morning, a group began their demonstration outside the county courthouse before moving to San Lorenzo Park later in the day. On Friday, a group of protesters marched to local banks and set up camp in Mission Park. As of Saturday, the demonstrators had returned to the county courthouse. You can follow their updates on Twitter as well.
Around the country, not unexpectedly, demonstrators have clashed with local law enforcement, particularly in New York, where 700 people were arrested while protesting on the Brooklyn Bridge. and some have also been pepper sprayed, among other incidents.
Santa Cruz activist Robert Norse is reporting a few issues with local police but so far, I have not heard of any arrests being made*. We’ll keep you posted.
*Addendum: There was an incident Thursday, however, in which an apparently drunk woman wandered into the meeting and began screaming and swearing. She eventually ended up punching an off-duty San Jose firefighter in the face and then fleeing. She was not located. Although this occurred at the Occupy Santa Cruz location, the suspect was not affiliated with the group.
