Oakland From Covid-19 To Cops: We Can’t Breath Caravan

Oakland June 1 Day Of Action To Defend Workers, Tenants, Communities

From Covid-19 To Cops: We Can’t Breath Caravan

For Immediate Release



PRESS RELEASE

Email: peoplesstrikebayarea [at] gmail.com

When: June 1, 2020 12:00 - 3:00
Where: California State Building 1515 Clay St. Oakland to Oakland Coliseum
What: From Covid-19 To Cops: We Can’t Breath Caravan
Why: Life over Profits: No Return Work Unless Workers Are Safe

Physical-Social Distancing At All Events


Oakland, CA Workers throughout this country are facing contamination by Covid-19 with a lack of reliable information and PPE protection. Essential workers, including nurses and delivery workers, face death on the job. Companies like Tesla are ordering workers back to work without providing testing, masks and other protective equipment. Governor Newsom and Cal-OSHA have given these bosses the go ahead to re-open without protecting worker lives.

At noon there will be a rally at the California State Building to demand that Cal-OSHA enforce the health
and safety laws. Governor Newsom has allowed Cal-OSHA to be understaffed with less than 200 inspectors
for California’s 18 million workers, making no physical inspections on the job to enforce the law. Their inactions are resulting in the deaths of workers and the contamination of their families and the community. We demand that Governor Newsom authorize 1,000 inspectors to the hospitals, Amazon, UPS, and factories like Tesla.

To add insult to injury, workers are being retaliated for speaking out about health and safety dangers at
SF General Hospital, Highland Hospital and many other work sites. We demand that employers who
terminate workers fighting for their health and safety on the job should be criminally prosecuted.

Speakers include:
* Carlos Gabriel, Tesla worker organizing for health and safety
* ILWU Local 34 President Keith Shanklin
* Darla Brown, SEIU 1021, fired from Highland Hospital
* Kim Cox, SEIU 1021, SF, Black Workers Unite
*Dr. Larry Rose, Former Medical Cal-OSHA
*Cheryl Thornton, SEIU 1021 SF DPH V.P. Community Public Centers
* Angie Sijun Lou UCSC Gaduate Student Striker For COLA fired by UC Bosses & Chancellor Janet Napolitano
*Mike Hutchinson, Education Activist

1:15PM to 2:00 PM: Caravan stops at Fruitvale & Oscar Grant Station for an educational Speakout & outreach.
There is still no plan for people locked in jails, prisons, and detention centers. Racist vigilante violence is on the rise again, and police violence never stopped.
The racists police murders including George Floyd have to stop NOW! From Minneapolis To Oakland!

Speakers include:
* Vickie Ramirez, SEIU 87, Janitorial/Cleaners
* Uncle Bobby/Cephus, Oscar Grant’s uncle
* Rick Perez, son killed by Richmond PD
* Eduardo Escobar, Essential Workers Unite
+ Possible speaker from Causa Justa/Just Cause

2:15PM-3PM: Caravan ends at the Coliseum/Oracle Arena with a closing Rally and Press Conference.
Oakland Coliseum Stadium Rally
Coliseum Way & 66th Ave. Oakland
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=Coliseum+Way+%26+66th+Ave&t=hl&ia=places&iaxm=places&strict_bbox=0&bbox=37.762532073399996%2C-122.21648315237574%2C37.7474160649774%2C-122.18927482412867&metatoken=0

We demand that no stadium and 3,000 1 million dollar condos be built at the Howard Terminal by A’s billion dollar owner John Fisher. Fisher who owns the GAP and runs the KIPP and Rocketship charter school chain is even refusing to pay rent to the Coliseum but wants public port land to build a stadium? The Democrat controlled legislature passed a new tax bill to pay for the infrastructure for the new stadium. We need money for working class public housing instead of million dollar condos.

Speakers include:
* Carlos Gabriel, Tesla worker
*Clarence Thomas ILWU Local 10 Secretary Treasurer Retired
* John Holmes, Higher Educators United
* Pamela Price, Civil Rights Attorney (& former DA candidate & mayoral candidate)
* Communities United for Restorative Justice
* People’s Strike – Bay Area



We are dying while corporations get bailouts, & wars abroad and at home continue. We cannot rely on the system that created this crisis to help us. We must stand together and help ourselves. People's Strike will strike the first of every month

The event will follow social distancing guidelines, including wearing masks & maintaining physical distance.

The caravan will be livestreamed and merged with others striking on June 1st through the broadcast on the People's Strike website

Initiated by People's Strike Bay Area & the Workers Solidarity Action Network.
bit.ly/fight-for-life
Workers Solidarity Action Network
https://www.facebook.com/workerssolidarityactionnetwork/