We need your help for Port Picket against War Profiteers

Dear friends and allies,

We need help from you and your organization for our community picket against war profiteers at the Port of Oakland on May 19th. Our goal is to shut down business by war profiteers that day to call attention to our demands: Stop War Shipments and War Profiteering - Port Money for Schools and Social Services - Bring the Troops Home Now!

Join us Saturday May 19th to Picket War Profiteers at the Port of Oakland!
Port Money for Schools & Social Services!
Picket at APL Terminal at Port of Oakland, 1579 Middle Harbor Road (bring horns and drums!)
[PDF of poster Map of picket location]

We will call on ILWU Local 10 to honor our picket line and not to cross. If Local 10 honors our picket line, as it did for similar pickets in 2003 and 2004, then work will be shut down. Local 10 has a long history of supporting community pickets and struggles, and is in the forefront of labor opposition to the war. However, the way to insure Local 10 honors our picket line is a big turnout of picketers and that's where you come in.

How can you and your organization help? There are a number of ways:

Publicize the May 19 picket by posting this message to your email list, web site, or sending it to personal contacts;

Distribute print and digital literature (PDF of poster Map of picket location) - contact portaction [at] riseup.net to arrange to get our beautiful print lit.;

Come to our final organizing meeting on Monday nigh at 7pm at NPML (see below);

Endorse May 19th and contribute funds; and most of all,

Join us on the picket line on May 19th and bring friends.

Every act of support and solidarity is important. When we unite and work in concert we have power. To be successful on May 19, we need to turn out a large number of pickets.

There are a number of critical issues which intersect at the port. It is a major hub for the war machine; little of the huge revenues generated at the Port fund human needs; the Port pollutes West Oakland; independent truckers are organizing for justice and a union; and ILWU Local 10 is there fighting for longshore workers. The Port offers a chance for building alliances between community-based organizations and campaigns. Thus the port, with its military shipments, is not just an anti-war issue. It is also an education and budget issue - an economic powerhouse that is not making a fair contribution to sustain Oakland and the region.

There are also governance issues, with a Port Commission that is allocating land as political patronage and not being accountable to community needs. It is a labor issue, with the commission leasing city property to labor-unfriendly businesses. It is a housing issue, with land being sold to developers who are building housing that is not affordable to residents of that area.

On April 7th, the Port Action Committee organized a rally in front of the Port of Oakland offices at Jack London Square which highlighted these issues. The rally, which also commemorated April 7, 2003 when police fired on anti-war protesters at the Port, was covered by major television, radio, and print media (Trib article Chron article ). Representatives of teachers, labor, veterans, anti-war movement, youth, and the community spoke at the rally. Now we've calling on all these forces to unite to picket war profiteers on May 19th.

The call for the Port picket has received endorsements from: Oakland Education Association; Bay Area Labor Committee for Peace & Justice; United for Peace & Justice, Bay Area; Oakland Green Party; Veterans for Peace; Vietnam Veterans Against the War; Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace (LMNOP); Coalition of School Unions of the Oakland District; Northern California Committees of Correspondence for Democracy & Socialism; Ella Baker Center; Idriss Stelley Foundation; and Cindy Sheehan.

Join us May 19th to Picket War Profiteers at the Port of Oakland! (May 19 is "Armed Forces Day" & also Malcolm X's birthday)
Port Money for Schools & Social Services!
Picket at APL Terminal at Port of Oakland, 1579 Middle Harbor Road (beginning at 7 am)
Continuous shuttle service from West Oakland BART throughout the day

For more info, or to arrange to get print literature, contact Port Action Committee at portaction [at] riseup.net

You're invited to attend our final planning meeting Monday night at 7pm, at the Niebyl-Proctor Marxist Library, 6501 Telegraph Ave., Oakland (near Alcatraz and within walking distance of Ashby BART).

In solidarity,
Jonathan Nack
for the Port Action Committee