Occupiers banned from sleeping in park
Jeremy Bailey, a member of Occupy Syracuse, looks over the list of resolutions given to protestors by Mayor Stephanie Miner. We live here, were the people who pay taxes for these roads, he said.
It all came down to a vote.
Only a week after Syracuse police evicted and arrested several members of Occupy Syracuse from Perseverance Park, Mayor Stephanie Miner held a special meeting with the Syracuse Urban Renewal Agency on Tuesday in City Hall. The meeting, which was open to the public, was held to pass a resolution that prevents protestors from staying in the park throughout the night.
Miner, who is the chair of SURA, presented ‘Resolution No. 3182’ to the agency’s three-member board, who then voted unanimously to pass it.
SURA owns 54 pieces of property throughout the city, including Perseverance Park. Because it owns the park, SURA reserves the right to prevent occupiers from staying there, according to the resolution.
‘SURA desires to protect its real property (‘SURA Property’) from unauthorized persons trespassing on SURA Property and further desires to reduce SURA’s liability as to such unauthorized persons,’ according to the resolution.
Jean Kessner, Common Council councilor-at-large, attended the meeting and said the mayor stressed her concern is with public safety. Although the occupiers cannot stay in Perseverance Park, they are allowed to be on the nearby sidewalk, which is considered public property.
‘You can’t, according to the Supreme Court, tell people they can’t be on the sidewalk,’ Kessner said.
However, the occupiers are not allowed to block pedestrian traffic on the sidewalk. This may prove difficult because the sidewalk is directly next to a Centro Bus stop, which many people utilize.
Kessner said she disagrees with the mayor’s decision to prevent the protestors from being in the park.
‘I personally do not understand why it has come to this,’ she said. ‘In America, we do have the constitution that allows us to exercise the right of free speech.’
After Syracuse Police Department being told to remove any tents or structures, the Occupy Syracuse members were reduced to a few tables, chairs and sleeping bags. Signs that read: ‘You can’t put a curfew on the 1st Amendment,’ ‘I can’t afford a lobbyist, so I made this sign’ and ‘Banks got bailed out, we got sold out’ surround the protestors’ tables.
Jeremy Bailey, a member of Occupy, said he believes the mayor drafted the resolution as a response to the Occupy Ball event, which took place outside of Miner’s campaign ball on Saturday.
Miner’s ball, held in the Landmark Theatre, was an effort to raise money for her 2013 re-election campaign. Tickets to the ball ranged from $250 to $1,000. Occupy Syracuse members protested outside the ball, Bailey said, because they wanted to make a statement about the use of money in elections.
‘We have a tyranny of oppression by the mayor,’ Bailey said. ‘She was looking for any reason to get rid of us.’
Miner could not be reached to comment.
‘She says she’s the leader of Syracuse. Well, the people are behind us — we are the people,’ Bailey said.
Aaron Williams, another member of Occupy Syracuse, said four or five others had been sleeping in the park before the resolution was passed. He said he thinks the new rules are unwarranted.
‘It’s limiting our First Amendment rights,’ he said. ‘All we’ve asked for is our right to protest.’
Williams said he does not understand why the mayor is preventing them from staying in the park because the occupiers have remained nonviolent during the 123 days they have been there.
Williams also said he does not think the occupiers are currently a public health hazard.
‘All we’ve got are blankets, tables and a chair,’ he said. ‘We’re conducive to public safety.’
For now, Williams said, occupiers will move to the sidewalk. If they are forced to leave the sidewalk, he said, their next plan is to ‘go mobile’ and protest at different locations around the city.
After the occupy eviction, the Department of Syracuse Parks, Recreation and Youth Programs erected a sign in Perseverance that reads: ‘Park closed dusk to dawn.’ Occupy member Melanie Digiglio said once she saw the sign, she had a feeling something like this would happen.
Digiglio, like other Occupy members, said she doesn’t see the point in moving the protestors a mere 8 feet from their current location.
She pointed to the sidewalk and said, ‘They’re saying it’s a safety hazard for us to be on the property, but it’s not a hazard for us to be over there.’
Published on January 31, 2012 at 12:00 pm
Contact Stephanie: snbouvia@syr.edu | @snbouvia
