Occupiers Arrested in the Burg, Leaving East New York
It was a busy weekend for Occupy Wall Street folks in Brooklyn: On Saturday night, an “occuparty” was held at a vacant condo on North 8th and Driggs in Williamsburg. According to the Daily News, a few dozen people “hung Christmas lights, spray painted slogans like ‘F–k the police’ and ‘Life is Protest’ on the building walls, but were civilized enough to pack some beer on ice in the empty building.” Eventually the cops broke it up, some protestors who were blocking traffic a couple blocks away were arrested, and six officers were injured in the melee. Brokelyn published an announcement in advance of the event on Friday that gives a bit of a sense of what it was about: “We’ll be converging at 207 North 8th Street at 10pm before heading to the space, which has lain vacant for years now, and is owned by a bank known to invest in bio-, chemical, and nuclear weapons, as well as cluster bombs used specifically by Qaddafi against the 2011 insurgency.” Meanwhile, in East New York, the Post reports that the occupiers who had taken over a house that is under foreclosure pressure are in the process of moving out and returning it to its owner.
Booze, Arrests At “Occuparty” In Williamsburg Last Night [Gothamist]
Arrests at Occupy Party in Williamsburg [NY Daily News]
Exiting Occupy Home [NY Post]
Flier photo by rosiegray/buzzfeed
Occupy Williamsburg’s Revolution Will Be Photographed
A couple photographs landed in our inbox indicating that the 99 percent was busy in Williamsburg this weekend. A tipster sent in the photo above, which was hung on the side of the hotel Two Trees is developing on Wythe and North 11th and protests the $15 million in tax-exempt bond financing the developer received for the project. Meanwhile, another reader sent in a photo of a banner hung on a stalled development at Bedford and South 4th (click through to see it) that says “This Means War.” The person who sent in the snapshot wrote: “Occupy Williamsburg is alive & well. Stories of its demise have been greatly exaggerated.” There’s going to be a meeting of an Occupy Williamsburg General Assembly tomorrow focusing, in part, on gentrification, according to a notice about the gathering: “The Williamsburg/Greenpoint re-zoning laws passed by the City Council in 2005 paved the way for a rapid, and continually jaw-dropping wave of gentrification. Yet even as luxury condos grow like weeds on the waterfront, artists’ spaces and small businesses get priced out and Starbucks’ presence on Bedord Ave. looms, there remains a dense interweaving of strong communities with intricate histories and both conflicting and common concerns.”
Occupy Williamsburg General Assembly [Facebook]