Updated link for registration form and convention call: https://bit.ly/31Ex4De

The annual Wisconsin State AFL-CIO Community Services Conference will be held March 12, 13, and 14 at the Madison Concourse Hotel and Governor’s Club. The conference will open with a plenary/general session at 1:00 p.m. on Thursday, March 12. Registration will be available that morning beginning at 10:00 a.m.

**Details including registration form, accommodation deadlines, workshop descriptions and more can be found here. **

This conference is a call to action with the intent that the education and information provided will allow participants to become more involved in both the labor movement and within their individual communities. The AFL-CIO Labor Engagement program is about “making the community a better place in which to live, work, raise a family, and retire”. It is about mobilizing union members  to address workplace and social justice issues. By building strong partnerships with other community and faith organizations, more can be achieved.

Labor’s involvement in our community is vital to creating and sustaining healthy communities. All across Wisconsin union members have rolled up their sleeves to help the community by volunteering to serve meals, coach teams, donate blankets and mittens, collect health and hygiene items and give back in so many other countless ways to those in need.

Over the three days, conference attendees will hear from the President and Secretary-Treasurer of the Wisconsin State AFL-CIO. Updates will be given on a number of labor initiatives, the upcoming spring election and Presidential primary, fall election, and much more. There is much work to be done, to make Wisconsin better for all working families. This is an excellent opportunity to hear first-hand about plans for the upcoming year.

Please submit your registration fee and completed registration form(s) by Monday – March 2, 2020.

If you have questions concerning the conference or need additional information/clarification, please contact Ann McNeary, AFL-CIO Labor Liaison and Conference Chair, at either labor@uwdc.org or 608-246-4355.

Driver Licences& Tuition For All Forum

English below

Porfavor asista a este foro donde Primitivo Torres, nuesto organizador VDLF a nivel estatal estara hablando sobre lo importante que son las licensia de conducir y la colegiatura estatal en el estado de Wisconsin

Miercoles 19 de Febrero alas 6:30pm en el Rigby Pub
119 E Main
Madison WI
———

Please come and Support our statewide organizer and campaign for Driver Licenses and Tuition for all Primitivo Torres as he will be speaking at this event host by ” Reach out Wisconsin”

DATE
Wednesday, Feb. 19

TIME
6:30pm to 8:30pm

PLACE
The Rigby Pub, 119 E. Main St.,Madison.

COST
Admission is FREE, as is parking downtown after 6pm.

#RiseUp

If you’re in Vancouver and can make it to Clark and Hastings please get there!

RCMP are moving in on the Unist’ot’en Healing Centre as this is being written and this is no time to stand down!

Live updates from Unist’ot’en are being posted here:

The action at the port has been led and organized by indigenous people and settlers are asked to report to Clark and Hastings to check in before going to other blockades. Dress warmly, people who can stay overnight are needed.

Follow this page for live info from the Port of Vancouver
https://www.facebook.com/events/520894505214204/

If you’re in Victoria join the ongoing occupation of the BC Legislature led by indigenous youth

In Winnipeg Indigenous youth and Supporters have been occupying MP Dan Vandal’s for over 172 hours

Organizing an action? Post it here:
https://www.facebook.com/events/221856442184296/

This is no time to stand down! We’re all tired but not as tired as our friends on the frontline facing the RCMP!

– Unist’ot’en Solidarity Brigade

Even though Black Lives Matter at School Week of Action has come to an end, the fight for educational justice for Black students continues. To make this a reality we need more than just divesting and removing the cops from our schools. We need a shift of power to those most impacted.

For our final Police Free Schools FAQ, we will be answering the question – “Why are we demanding community-control over school safety and what does that look like?”

#PoliceFreeSchools
#InvestInYouth
#CommunityControl
#BlackLivesMatterAtSchool

On Saturday, January 25, 2020, Milwaukeeans held a stand for peace, to protest the escalating threat of war with Iran. The event was organized by Peace Action of Wisconsin, Party for Socialism and Liberation, Greater Milwaukee Green Party, Milwaukee DSA, Milwaukee Solidarity, War and Peace: the Artists Conflict, Wisconsin Bail Out The People Movement, and Wisconsin FRSO. Let’s not forget that the threat of war is still very much with us. #NoWaronIran #USOutofIraq

Embassy Protection Collective

Innu demonstrate against NATO and RCMP repression

https://bit.ly/2OAP24f

By M. Gouldhawke (Métis & Cree)
Updated: February 2, 2020
(Originally published December 21, 2019)

“The myth of the RCMP is that they came to protect us from the whisky traders and bad guys. They came to protect the conqueror’s property and they still protect the conqueror’s property.”
– Maria Campbell, Toronto Star, 1989

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) raid of the Gidimt’en checkpoint on Wet’suwet’en territory on January 7, 2019, was not only the enforcement of an injunction on behalf of a pipeline company but also the continuation of the colonialist, imperialist and capitalist history of the force itself.

The RCMP are not so much a domestic policing agency as an occupying foreign army, as highlighted by the fact that the RCMP still maintain their own camp in Wet’suwet’en territory and continue to harass people at the long-running Unist’ot’en healing centre which the nearby Gidimt’en checkpoint had been set-up in solidarity with.

Canada was only six years old when it established the North-West Mounted Police in 1873. This original name for the RCMP outlined their colonial purpose, as the Northwest was not yet fully part of Canada at this time, having only been fraudulently purchased from the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) three years earlier and remaining largely under the effective control of the Métis, Cree, Saulteaux and other Indigenous nations.

Indigenous effective control ran contrary to all fraudulent claims to the territory by Canada, since the HBC had never purchased the land from Indigenous peoples in the first place in order to sell it to anyone, and the Canadian military had to be sent to Red River (Winnipeg) in 1870 to remove the Métis Provisional Government there, and then again in 1885, further west (in what is now Saskatchewan), to put down the Northwest Resistance….

….While the RCMP’s entire history is certainly abhorrent, such behaviour is clearly not aberrant for the force. The RCMP are part of the global structure of colonialism, imperialism and capitalism, and varied forms of oppression must remain part of its working repertoire in order for it to fulfil its function. Only systemic social change can fundamentally address the systemic oppression the RCMP both defends and partakes in itself….

Further reading and sources:

BC Native Blockades (Warrior Publications)

Violence Against Indigenous Women (Warrior No.2, 2006)

List of Controversies involving the RCMP (Wikipedia)

Final Report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (2019)

Books:

An Unauthorized History of the RCMP, by Lorne & Caroline Brown

The RCMP’s official 125th anniversary book portrayed Indigenous people as ghosts in the wake of the “March West” which expanded Canadian colonialism by force.

RCMP attack a Lil’wat/St’at’imc logging blockade and Mohawk solidarity action in 1990
(photo by David Buzzard)

International Day of Solidarity with the Wet’suwet’en

This is an international day of solidarity with the Wet’suwet’en. If you can’t make it to this event join us outside of Kaslo City Hall, or find an event near you!!

The RCMP have raided the Yintah and made arrests of Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs, their land defenders, and their allies!! We are gathering outside of Michelle Mungall’s office in Nelsonl to stand with the Wet’suwet’en Nation and tell our government that Indigenous Rights and Title need to be respected and honored before the rights of corporations.

#LandBack2020 #WetsuwetenStrong

By Abayomi Azikiwe, MLK Day Detroit

A broad range of organizations united in Detroit on Martin Luther King Jr. Day to extend the struggle into the third decade of the 21st century. On Monday January 20, the 17th Annual Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

Rally & March was held in the city of Detroit at the Historic St. Matthew’s-St. Joseph’s Episcopal Church on Woodward Avenue in the North End section of town.This event has become a hallmark for social justice activists and organizations within southeastern Michigan.

The church was filled to capacity with many youth attending alongside community residents, artists, representatives of trade unions and religious groups. Despite the cold weather and snow, people came out in response to the call issued by the MLK Committee aimed at generating continued engagement around questions of racism, national oppression, economic exploitation, climate change, imperialist militarism, mass incarceration, disability rights, universal suffrage and the organization of low-wage workers.

A tribute to the late former United States Congressman John Conyers, Jr. (1929-2019) was delivered by City Councilwoman Emeritus Rev. Dr. Jo Ann Watson. As a longtime Civil Rights and community activist, Watson served on the staff of Congressman Conyers for many years. Watson pointed out the role of Conyers as an elected official representing the people of Detroit and other suburban communities. He would hire the late Mrs. Rosa Parks, the woman who would initiate the mass Civil Rights Movement after being arrested for refusing to concede her seat to a white man in Montgomery, Alabama on December 1, 1955. Parks moved to Detroit in the late 1950s after facing tremendous social and economic pressure in the state of Alabama.

Conyers, who served in Congress for over 50 years, was a frequent guest at the Detroit MLK Day event prominently seated annually in the front row due to his pivotal role in engineering the national holiday in honor of the martyred Civil Rights and Antiwar leader. Just several days after the assassination of Dr. King in Memphis, Tennessee on April 4, 1968, the Detroit legislator would submit a bill to designate January 15 as a national holiday.

Eventually the holiday commemoration went into effect in January of 1986. King’s birthday is celebrated on the third Monday of January when government offices, banks and many educational institutions and businesses are closed in his honor. The Detroit MLK Day commemoration is designed to highlight the peace and social justice legacy of Dr. King. There was an opening rally which featured a myriad of organizations actively working on issues relevant to the local, national, international communities.

After the rally there was a march through the North End in solidarity with the people against property tax foreclosures, water shut-offs, gentrification, political repression and in support of jobs, community stabilization and democratic rights. The North End as an historic community in the city has been a central target of the existing corporate-imposed administration in Detroit for the forced and systematic removal of residents through the seizure of homes for over assessed delinquent property taxes, the termination of water services to households and the re-population of the area utilizing high-rents and increased property values.

Since the founding of the Annual MLK Day March & Rally in 2004, the idea has been to reconnect the people with the actual work of King over a period of his active political life from 1955 to the time of his martyrdom in 1968. During the last two years of his life, the co-founder of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) attempted to refocus his work to address the plight of African Americans living in large urban areas of both the South and the North.

This reorientation was carried out through the work of SCLC during the summer of 1966 in the Chicago Freedom Movement and their work in Cleveland utilizing boycotts and demonstrations to demand housing reforms and jobs for the unemployed and poor the following year. The work of Dr. King in Chicago and Cleveland during 1966 and 1967 respectively, exposed the continued existence of institutional racism in the northern cities and the need for fundamental social reforms which would guarantee housing, healthcare, jobs and an annual income for all families living in the U.S.

By early 1967, Dr. King had come out solidly against the U.S. intervention in Vietnam. He often described the war as unjust and an enemy of the poor. Dr. King viewed the genocidal war in Vietnam as a reflection of a much deeper malady within the American system where the history of African enslavement and ongoing national oppression was a driving force for imperialism throughout the globe.

Participant Speakers and Presenters Highlight Rich Political and Cultural Legacy in Detroit and Beyond

The keynote speaker for the 2020 MLK Day Rally was Rev. Dr. Luis Barrios, the President of the Board of Directors at the Inter-religious Foundation for Community Organization (IFCO) based in New York City. Barrios, an intellectual and clergyman, is also a faculty member at the City College of New York (CCNY) where he teaches young people about the social impact of the Criminal Justice system in the U.S.

Barrios spoke on the attempts by MLK to build an alliance of nationally oppressed groups in the U.S. in order to eliminate racism and poverty. A large aspect of Barrios’ work is centered around support for the Cuban Revolution through travel challenges and campaigns aimed at eliminating the decades-long blockade against the Caribbean nation which has been building socialism since the Revolution in 1959.

Other performers and speakers included: Bobbi Thompson of the Springwells Choral based in Detroit; Cosecha Detroit, the local affiliate of the national organization concerned about improving the social plight of migrant workers who in Michigan are denied the right to driver’s licenses; the African Bureau of Immigration and Social Affairs, which works directly with undocumented workers from the continent who are often overlooked in the national discussions surrounding immigration; Fight for $15, a labor organization campaigning for a significant hike in the minimum wage; Sunrise Movement, a youth-led organization, organizing around climate change; and Geopolitics Alert, a news website educating the public around the role of U.S. imperialism in many areas of the globe.

The MLK Committee each year presents a “People’s Spirit of Detroit” award to some outstanding activists and organizations. This year the award was granted to members of the Denby High School Football team which came under racist attacks during the semi-final game held against Almont in the Oakland County City of Walled Lake. The attacks began after several members of the team “took a knee” in solidarity with the people combatting racism and injustice in the U.S.

After the rally and march, a community meal was provided free of charge by the Wobbly Kitchen. Later a cultural program coordinated by Aurora Harris was presented featuring poets and musicians such as Joe

Kidd & Sheila Burke, One Single Rose, Maryam Lowen, Jim Perkinson, Wardell Montgomery, Shushanna Shakur, and others.

Event Sponsored and Endorsed by Many Organizations

MLK Day was made possible by the generous monetary and in-kind contributions of a host of community organizations, individuals and institutions. Many other groups endorsed the activity and helped to publicize the event.

Some of the co-sponsors were: the ACLU of Michigan, Avalon Bakery, the Buck Dinner Fund, the Detroit Active and Retired Employees Association (DAREA), Detroit Disability Power, the Detroit Greens, Detroit Wobbly Kitchen, Yvonne and Nelson Jones, Jewish Voice for Peace, Michigan Coalition for Human Rights, Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice (MECAWI), the Moratorium NOW! Coalition, Michigan League of Conservation Voters, Michigan Welfare Rights Organization (MWRO), Mosaic DesignGroup, NextGen Michigan, People’s Water Board, St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Sugar Law Center for Economic & Social Justice, Linda Szyszko, Truth Telling Project from Ferguson & Beyond, UAW Local 160, Unite Here Local 24, Viola Liuzzo Park Association, We the People of Detroit, A. Phillip Randolph Institute, National Lawyers Guild, and others.

The rally and march was widely covered in the local media through the presence of television stations and the City of Detroit communications division.

https://www.facebook.com/MLKDayDetroit/

17th Annual Detroit MLK Day Rally & March