[Peace] minutes of weekly AWARE meeting 2008-04-20

[Randall Cotton]

Minutes of 4/20/08 AWARE meeting are below, but first, the Upcoming
Events Calendar:

April 21 (Monday) 10PM, UPTV (cable channel 6) (might be pre-empted by
Urbana City Council meeting).
"AWARE on the Air" broadcast (from last week due to City Council
pre-emption a week ago)

April 23 (Wednesday) 7:00 PM, Room 314 Illini Union on campus
UofI sponsored debate about hate speech and how to "balance" free speech
and equal protection.

April 24 (Thursday) 7PM, Brookens Center (1776 E. Washington St., Urbana)
County Board meeting where privatization of the Champaign County Nursing
Home will be considered (first item on agenda).

April 24 (Thursday) 7:30PM Channing-Murray (1209 W. Oregon, Urbana)
"Awakening from our Trance: Reversing Global Climate Change" w/Carolyn
Treadway. This event is co-sponsored by AWARE.

April 24 (Thursday) 7:30PM Spurlock Museum on campus
(600 S. Gregory, Urbana)
"Mayhem in Mesopotamia - the Protection of Iraq's Cultural Heritage"
Dr. Donny George Youkhanna, former director of the Iraq Museum in Baghdad

April 28 (Monday) 7PM Urbana City Council Chambers, 400 S. Vine St.
(also televised live on UPTV (cable channel 6))
Urbana City Council Committee of the Whole meeting.
Continuing discussion on new UPTV guidelines and procedures for submitting
materials and videos for UPTV. Once again, many may press to limit speech,
but others are needed to illustrate how the best response to offensive
speech is not censorship, but rather more speech countering it.

May 9 (Friday) 9AM, Courtroom E, Champaign County Courthouse (101 E. Main,
Urbana).
Brian Chesley court date - anticipated filing for new trial, and more
importantly SENTENCING

May 12 (Monday) 1:30PM, Courtroom A, Champaign County Courthouse (101 E.
Main, Urbana)
First session of Patrick Thompson's third trial.

****
Minutes of 4/20/08 AWARE meeting:

About 20 in attendance

News of the week was heard, courtesy of Carl Estabrook

Finance Report:
87.75 check for 13 days at Farmer's Market
deposit form last week's meeting
balance: 2104.00

Main Event monthly street demonstration:
Flyers being considered: IVAW flyer from last time, Clearwater material.
There is a new lock on the AWARE storage room door. Karen, Jan and Durl
have keys. Randall suggested two folks volunteer each month to bring
copies of the letter from Champaign Police documenting our right to
distribute flyers to motorists (we had trouble last time with Champaign
officers who didn't immediately accept this right and it took some effort
on Ricky's part to straighten this out - things could have been worse).
Randall and Durl volunteer for next Main Event.

Working group reports:
*****************
Anti-Racism:
=========
Brian Chesley case: next scheduled court date is May 9 at 9:00 a.m. in
Courtroom E (motion for new trial expected) and sentencing probably as
well.

Patrick Thompson's third trial is approaching. First court date of the
trial is May 12, 1:30 PM, Courtroom A. There is a call out for folks to
volunteer to take notes for a half or full day so that daily reports of
the trial can be sent to keep the community apprised. Contact Chris Evans
at caevans2 at hotmail.com .

New comprehensive pamphlet distributed on Patrick's case and the upcoming
3rd trial.

Note: Carol Ammons, co-founder of CUCPJ and recently installed County
Board member, will face Republican challengers after all in the November
election, so election campaign work is gearing up.

Student Groups:
===========
Palestine Awareness Week - AWARE received a nice thank you letter from the
President of the Arab Student Association. He mentioned cumulative
attendance of about 200 folks. Very appreciative of our support. Good
discussions noted particularly at the Monday night film showing and the
Tuesday night panel, each with 50-60 in attendance.

Quad day registration is open and Karen plans to follow up on this.

Blackwater Working Group:
====================
Conference call after meeting with Clearwater to prepare for April 29th
meeting in Springfield for a series of meetings with Illinois State Police
and other police groups, perhaps NRA, organized by co-sponsors of the
legislation opposing Blackwater - purpose is to see what legislation they
wouldn't oppose. Head of Illinois State Police is said to feel that
Blackwater is indispensable.

Mention made of "Operation Falcon", one of Project Censored's top censored
stories of 2008. See:

http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/6-operation-falcon-raids/

AWARE on the Air:
==============
Last week's show pre-empted by very long Urbana City Council meeting (the
one where free speech on UPTV was at issue). A request will be made for a
move to Tuesday 10PM.

Old Business:
***********
Farmer's Market:
Registration for first 12 weeks is paid. Setup this year is 2 chairs, 2
tubs, 2 tables. Sign-up sheet passed around - slots are now 1 hour 20
minutes. Umbrella is available at the Kruses (2007 George Huff Dr.,
Urbana) if setup and teardown folks can both accomodate that. May 10 is
first date. Suggestion made to keep extra copies of Main Event flyers so
they can be made available at the Farmer's Market booth.

Billboard:
Local Quakers going forward with Billboard project publicizing the cost of
the Iraq War ($720 million/day, w/reference to Stiglitz/Bilmes). Adams
Outdoor Advertising has approved a billboard for them starting May 5th.
Location unknown and will be assigned by AOA. Individual contributions
requested by check. Total cost is $775 for a billboard that would normally
cost around $2300. $650 is for the reusable vinyl, so the posting fee is
only $125, allowing for repeated use at little cost.

Township legislation:
Contact to be made with Mike Frerichs regarding changes in state law
regarding township advisory referenda.

New Ideas:
*********
Take advantage of Youtube for some of our events.

Events of the past week
*******************
Janet W. relates attending the 10th Annual V-day event "V to the tenth" at
the Superdome in New Orleans, noting that Amy Goodman and Naomi Klein were
featured among others. She mentioned in particular a focus on the extreme
sexual violence in Congo and the heroic work of Dr. Denis Mukwege. see:
http://v10.vday.org/node/692 . Congo is the next planned venue for V-day.

Mort commented on Palestine Awareness Week event with Prof. Nassar from
ISU, remarking how the talk focused on the emotion of the time - what it
was like in 1948 and how it shouldn't be forgotten.

Barbara described a presentation at United Church of Christ focusing on
Chiapas by someone who's worked there for 2-3 years. Increasing
militarization of the Mexican government there was striking. There are
many immigrants from Chiapas in our area (also from neighboring
Guatemala).

Neil related how TIF districting being planned for benefit of big
developers in Rantoul stands to cut funding for schools there as part of a
23 year plan. Vote anticipated before the end of the month.

Upcoming events
*************
Conrad speaks of Sunday, May 11 performances of a young children's musical
"The Beatitude Attitude" at the Mennonite Church, emphasizing a life that
is lived to promote peace and justice. Free and open to the public.