Photos From Police Raid On Protest Encampment In Arcata

what was the encampment for? who called the cops?

The encampment is to call attention to the plight of the homeless who are all "trespassers", their general criminalization the cruelty of not allowing them anyplace to sleep and the shody treatment they receive from law enforcement.

I am told that people in the neighborhood around the encampment had been whining to police about their presence. Considering the instability of the grossly inflated housing market, which has placed housing out of the reach of so many Americans in the first place, it might be poetic justice for these intolerant home owners to become homeless when the speculation inflated bubble bursts.

Personally I have not been a big fan of such direct action and civil disobedience in general prefering to think that we have other channels to identify and correct problems but after living here in the big city and investigating the mechanizations of local government I realize that it is a closed loop wherein the police investigate them selves, large corporate interests own the government and bully others, even to the point of attempting to buy a new DA via a phony "grass roots" recall in order to get a favorable ruling regarding their criminal activities which have devastated much of the local economy and environment. The daily doings of the court otherwise consist primarily of a parade of low income people, often on the conveyor belt of the court's assembly line for petty or fictitious reasons and with little means to defend themselves which is their real "crime".

hi. the purpose of the camp is to illustrate the lack of concern the city has for the houseless people in the community.
in arcata, the city council has been dragging its feet for years on the issue of affordable housing and shelters for those who can't even afford the least expensive housing. the encampment is designed to show the plight of houseless, how there is no safe, free place for folks. we are trying to gain support from the community, so we can build a free, people-run campground. we are not asking for the city to build us anything, we are asking the people of the community to offer up space that we can regulate ourselves. during the coldest part of the winter, in january, we managed an emergency shelter for a solid week. it cost no money, and we sheltered over 100 people that week. that shows precedence that we dont need govt interferance, no aseworkers, just friends helping friends.
people were arrested for gathering peacefully, and sleeping in an empowered group. officially, however, people were taken because they were camped in a public park and didnt leave when the police told us to.

thanks fo ryour interest.