March+24+Notes

MEETING AT IMMIGRANT MOVEMENT INTERNATIONAL March 24

Organizations Present:

This is where we had our meeting They provide all sorts of services to immigrants. They also came up with a "migrant manifesto".
 * 1. Immigrant Movement International**

They also provide many services. They have workshops and English lessons. Contact: Liz Baber - 6464968009 - Liz.b.inny@mail.com
 * 2. Emerald Isle Immigration Center**

They created a coop, and offer services such as help with owed salaries, health and education. They need volunteers. Contact: Yadira 3475009124
 * 3. Workers Justice Project.**

They teach English classes to over 500 immigrants a day and off many services, too, including: Programs for seniors Programs for young people Foreclosure prevention program They emphasized in their talk the importance of credit unions
 * 4. Queens Community House**

Our Discussion: We need to work in order to bring occupy to the boroughs. Most people are attracted to the more "flamboyant" occupy movement, and we often forget that it's not only about protesting in manhattan.

Queens is made mostly of immigrant communities. So Occupy Wall Street is not necessarily representative of their issues. Protesting is often not a possibility for immigrants, both documented and undocumented because we have much more to loose in case of arrest. In the case of undocumented people, even going to Zuccotti where all the cops are is a scary thought. How t bring occupy to them? How to bring their issues back to Occupy? Community organizing as a way to bring occupy to the immigrants.

Maybe what we should keep doing are things like this. The truth is that people don't have time to go to all sorts of meetings, so it would be best if we, Making Worlds, went to the meetings, went to different organizations and talked about Occupy as commons. Nobody owns Occupy. There is no stampe. "No one can tell me I'm not Occupy." A better slogan for these purposes is the "we are the 99 percent" rather than "Occupy Wall Street".