[Imc-newsroom] Madison action -- June 13-18, 2002

[Sascha Meinrath]

here's a call for interested reporters to come to Madison and help with
coverage of the conference of mayors on june 13-18, 2002.  it's a great
opportunity to build some communication and solidarity with our friends up
north, get some great coverage of the event, etc.

could we put this on our collective radar -- i'm thinking about going and
am wondering if other people are interested.

--sascha

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Greetings IMCstas -

I'm wxm with the Madison IMC. I'd like to put out a plea
for collective coverage on an event that will be
happening here in our hometown in a month.

Come June 13-18 2002, Madison, WI will become the
smallest city ever to host the U.S. Conference of
Mayors. In a nutshell, this gathering is a chance for the
power elites in our municipalities to schmooze each
other and cozy up to corporate interests, who have
turned these conferences into backroom deal sessions
where they negotiate the privatization of cities' services,
consolidate corporate power at the expense of citizen
input, etc. The public is barred from attending most of
the events, and the decisions that will be made at these
events will affect municipalities around the country. It's
another facet of globalization, but it's concentrated at
the local level - OUR local level - what the World Bank is
now calling "Glocalization" - and it's time to speak out.

Our fair city is gearing up for quite a spectacle. While
mayors from all over the country will hob-nob with
corporate lobbyists on private golf outings, parties and
the like, Madison police will be deploying their special
riot squad and are planning a "soft perimeter" around
the conference location, closing down several public
buildings and grounds (potentially including the two
lakes that Madison, an isthmus, is situated between).

Security costs alone have more than SEPTUPLED
since the announcement of planned protests, thanks to
sensationalist rhetoric about the supposed onslaught
of "violent anarchists" who will supposedly descend in
hordes here for the weekend.

As an IMC in a relatively small city, our resources are
thin and stretched to the limit. That's where we need
your help.

On behalf of the Madison IMC, I'm putting out a plea and
asking for any help from anyone who's concerned
about the increasing (and already unacceptable)
corporate influence on local governments. This is a
cancer both global AND local. We'd love to have your
help in any way you see fit. Here are a couple of
suggestions:

1) COME TO MADISON JUNE 13-18. There will be lots
of activity going on, plenty of things to cover, and seeing
as how this is a small town not used to "unrest" (except
way back in the '60s, when we were the 'Berkeley of the
Midwest') things may get interesting in a hurry.

In addition, chances are your mayor or municipal
executive will be very accessible, as they'll be traipsing
all around Madison in public on several outings. What a
great time to engage in some controversial questioning
on unfamiliar ground! We'd love to have you here, and
our activist community can help help with housing,
food, etc. See the Creative Peoples Resistance for
more information on the (still developing) plans for the
weekend:

Creative Peoples Resistance (CPR):
http://www.resist-the-mayors.org/

Also, there is the Cities for People website:
http://www.citiesforpeople.org

2) REPORT ON CORPORATE INFLUENCE IN YOUR
CITY. If you can't make it to the meeting, that's okay -
take some time to write about how corporations  and
other special interests are warping democracy for their
own designs in the place where you live. If your
community has had experience with the U.S.
Conference of Mayors (or the Mayor's Business
Council, check their members, many names will be
familiar), write a story on it! Muckrake about  corruption
in your town!

Alternately, you could dig up the dirt on your
mayor/municipal executive and how they've used and
abused their powers at the behest of corporate
citizenry. It never hurts to remind the powers-that-be
how much you care...

We've created a special archive of Mayor's conference
stories that have been produced so far and  we'd love to
add yours into the mix. This provides a wonderful
opportunity for collective, distributed journalism - just
because we all can't be together in one physical place
doesn't mean we can't coordinate our power and shine
the light on wrongness. Write what you can, post it to
your IMC, and then let us know.

You can check out the work we've already done at our
Mayor's features page at the Madison IMC:

http://madison.indymedia.org/mayors

There is also a link to this page off our IMC's front page
- it's the second one below our ((i)) graphic in the upper
left-hand corner of the page, marked "Mayors features."

We think this is an important and underreported
issue,and we'd like your help in giving it some more
coverage. If you can spare the time and effort, we'd
loveto know what you think. Feel free to respond to my
email address above and I'll pass it onto our local list. If
anyone thinks they can actually make it out to Madison
for the weekend, drop a line and we'll fill you in on more
of the details.

Thanks - and keep up the inspiring work everyone

-wxm