We had a fun and productive day at the LOISAIDA Festival yesterday. The weather was with us if not a little windy at times. Tabling with me were Ann Eagan, Marty Rajandran, Catherine Skopic and Tom Siracuse. Also at the event were members Ken Gale and Matt Borenstein. We were tabling in the “green zone,” the area designated for environmental groups. We were there along with the Raging Grannies, United for Action and Riverkeeper, among others.
We shared our table with the 6th Street Community Center, which provided chairs and tables for us (thank you, Howard Brandstein), and with David Galarza, who was petitioning for a group trying to halt the construction of a garbage incinerator in Arecibo PR. We also met Bronx community and political activist, Ed Figueroa, who was just across from us with the group “33 Mujeres,” which is fighting for the release of Oscar Lopez Rivera.
The festival kicked off with a short parade, including a marching band organized, coincidentally, by a neighbor of mine from my block in the Bronx (she’s been telling me for the past three years that she was going to find the funding to do this).
SDIPN tabled with information about the City Council Resolution, various flyers, our “shut down” petition, and sign up sheets. We filled seven petition sheets, and signed up eight new people, including Eileen Bardel with Peace Action of Staten Island, who also joined our Action Committee. Eileen invited me to speak at their next meeting on June 11, to explain how her members can get involved with SDIPN.
We also had drawing materials available for children, whom we asked to “Paint us a picture of the world you want to see:”
Our thanks to everyone who helped to make our participation in the festival go off without a hitch.
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