Photo by Melissa Skinner: People marching down Main Street to support Occupy Wall Street
Melissa Skinner
The Paw Print
Activists in support of the Occupy Wall Street movement gathered Friday to demonstrate against governmental corporate bailouts and in support of the 99 Percent.MoveOn.org, a federally funded Political Action Committee (PAC), are working to inspire average Americans into politics. Movements such as Occupy Wall Street, Rebuild the American Dream, and the 99 Percent members are made up of citizens of all classes, race, gender, and political affiliations. These people are joining forces to get the American public’s voices heard by the government. They rise up to put an end to collaborations between government and large corporations and to bring the government back to the people.
The “99 Percenters” include those of us who earn less than $1 million. The activists are working towards more jobs creation and fairness among the class systems. Their frustration lays in the fact that 1 percent of the population makes 20 percent of the income in our country. The next top 20 percent make 60 percent of the income. That leaves 20 percent of American income to those of us who make up the remaining 79 percent of the population.
Friday afternoon, a group of almost 40 people gathered with picket signs on Main and 6th Street, where the highway splits into the two one-way streets. Signs reading “Where Are The Jobs,” “Less War, More Jobs,” “Protect Schools Not Millionaires,” as well as many others promoted a sense of solidarity and spurred many drivers passing by the group to honk their horns in support of the movement.
Local Alamosa resident Beth Kinney says that she is picketing because she “supports Occupy and that it’s time for the government to stop coddling the millionaires.” She went on to say, “The top 400 richest people have more assets than the bottom 160 million. It’s crazy, it’s just insane.”
Adams State College students Darya Virden and Tegan Oehmen agreed that they felt the need to gather as a group for their own future job security. As college students, they are concerned about the job market they will be entering upon graduation.
The organizer of Friday’s event, Gail Vonderweidt, San Luis Valley Regional Organizer for Renew the American Dream, says that at the age of 68, “I couldn’t sit down anymore. I had to do something to renew the American Dream!”
Vonderweidt and her husband James Bird moved to Alamosa about a year ago. Once a part of the upper middle class, Vonderweidt says she and her husband are not experiencing retirement as they had thought it would be.
Unable to sell their Colorado Springs home and living off social security benefits, Vonderweidt says, “We all have to assume responsibility for sitting back [after President Obama took office]. The American public stopped paying attention.”
Vonderweidt and Bird joined Robin Crites, Democratic Chair in Rio Grande County, at a house meeting for the movement “Rebuild the American Dream.” In this house and many others across the nation, concerned citizens began work on a “Contract for the American Dream.”
Approximately 130 thousand Americans joined forces online and in their communities to write and rate almost 26 thousand ideas of how to restore the American Dream. Together, ordinary people like Vonderweidt, Bird, and Crites identified the 10 most important steps to renew the Dream and get the economy back on track (Contract for the American Dream). To view the contract, visit the website http://contractrebuildthedream.com.
Another event, a march from Cole Park to Adams State College, took place on Saturday morning. A group of men, women, students, and children walked with picket signs in hand to the ASC campus where the group heard testimonies from several of the activists.
Safiya Balekian, mother of the event’s organizer Bernita Balekian, brought greetings from her recent experience on Wall Street. Balekian is very active in the Occupy Wall Street movement and believes “I know we can create a better world…it’s about regular people just standing up!”
Balekian says that when people ask her why she is here [protesting] she replies, “Why aren’t you here?”
Glenda Maes, volunteer at KRZA F.M., called the young people in the group to action. “We need you young people to get involved…use your voice! Call your friends, your neighbors, bring your families.” She went on to say, “We are here to support you as your elders who have been down this same road.”
With 950 cities around the world marching for many of the same reasons, the activists are feeling confident in their efforts. Vonderweidt finds it exciting that the movement’s slogan “Rebuild the American Dream” is now coming out of the mouths of men and women of the United States Congress.
Confidence and hope were evident at both of the peaceful gatherings, creating a belief that change will come. Vonderweidt says, “I ended the war in Vietnam. I, along with thousands of others. It wasn’t one group’s efforts, but a collaboration.”
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