02.21 The Radicalization of Ron Kim
NYC’s 10-year plan, the great Marlon Riggs, get to know Maya Wiley
It’s the final week of Black History Month, but don’t let that stop you from revering Black excellence every day. Celebrating some iconic Aquarians below as well as the unveiling of a monumental jobs guarantee plan from Rep. Ayanna Pressley. Also, get to know mayoral candidate Maya Wiley and Gov Cuomo’s enemy numero uno (as of last Wednesday!), Democrat Assembly Member Ron Kim.
What else can we say? Another week, another fatal climate disaster that Republicans refuse to acknowledge is a result of deregulation. If you can, please check out these resources of how we can help our prim@s in Texas.
ON THE RADAR
PUBLIC COMMENT: NYPD Use Policy of Surveillance Tech Deadline to submit: 02.25 Speak on everything from NYPD use of facial recognition to tracking social media networks. Make some noise!
ACTION: Sunday, 02.21: March for Malcolm X & Community Food Drive with @BlackWomxnsMarch
12 pm @ 3940 Broadway, Manhattan: Celebration of Black life, love, joy, and resistance in honor of Malcolm X
12:30 pm @ 135th St. and St. Nicholas Ave, Manhattan: Community food drive
WATCH: Monday, 02.22 10 am: Hearing to create a non-police emergency response for mental health emergencies
Int 2210 would require an Office of Community Mental Health within the Department of Health, a citywide mental health emergency response protocol, and a mental health emergency response unit to respond to mental health emergencies. Requires NYPD, 911 response, and new hires to be trained on mental health protocol. Int 2222 would create a 3-digit mental health hotline. (VIRTUAL ROOM 2)
WATCH: Tuesday, 02.23 10 am: Hearing on 10 yr land-use plan that takes into account racial and socioeconomic disparities
Int 2186 would create a ten-year comprehensive planning cycle connecting budget, land use, and strategic planning processes. The cycle would include a review of City conditions, including racial and socioeconomic disparities, access to opportunity, displacement risk, short- and long-term risks, impacts of prior development and budget decisions, and current and projected infrastructure needs. (VIRTUAL ROOM 3)
WATCH: Wednesday, 02.24 10 am: Hearing to move traffic crash investigations from the NYPD to the Department of Transportation
Int 2224 would transfer the primary responsibility for investigating serious vehicular crashes from the NYPD to the department of transportation (VIRTUAL ROOM 3)
NY State Senator Anna Kaplan hosts an annual celebration of Black trailblazers including Leslie Davis and Dorothy L. Royal as well as local essential workers, healthcare heroes, and students.
READ: Rep. Ayana Pressley Unveils Federal Jobs Guarantee Resolution
“A federal job guarantee is an important investment in the American people, our communities, and an equitable economy that works for all. It affirms the right to meaningful, dignified work and a living wage.” - Rep. Pressley
provide every person with an enforceable legal right to a quality job
calls for the creation of federal jobs that meet long-neglected community, physical and human infrastructure needs, such as delivering quality care for children and seniors, building and sustaining 21st-century transit systems, strengthening neighborhoods, and protecting the environment.
CULTURAL WORK
Celebrating Aquarius icons in BHM:
Marlon Riggs, filmmaker, educator, poet, and gay rights activist
Blackness, Gayness Representation: Marlon Riggs Unpacks It All in His Films
Previews of Tongues Untied (1989), Color Adjustment (1991), and Black is...Black Ain’t (1995).
Signifying Meets the Media: An Interview with Marlon Riggs by Akiba at San Francisco Art Institute, 1992.
Marlon Riggs’ work is on the Criterion Channel.
I Shall Not Be Removed, a memorial to Marlon Riggs by Karen Everet
02.18 is a powerful double-whammy bday—celebrate the genius of Audre Lorde and Toni Morrison:
Audre Lorde reads Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic of Power, 1978.
Toni Morrison reading an excerpt of A Mercy & in conversation with Fran Lebowitz at NYPL, 2008.
Other tings:
Printed Matter’s Virtual Art Book Fair, Feb 24-28. Printed Matter is combining its NYC/LA events into one mega virtual moment this week. Need art for your walls? Wanna support independent artists and publishers from all over the world in the comfort of your own home? Yeah, us too.
Activation Residency is a Black trans-led artist residency aiming to generate safer and more collaborative space, adapt to its residents’ needs, and create portals to futures needed now.
Take a workshop with W Type Foundry (en español), March/April
SOFT POWER VOTE
READ: Who is Assembly Member Ron Kim?
He has become Cuomo’s biggest critic by seeking the truth regarding nursing home Covid deaths.
We love to see it: Dianne Morales and Maya Wiley endorse each other for #2 spots! #FollowBlackWomen
READ: Get to know Maya Wiley: “I got two things I must do in life: Stay Black and die. Everything else is a choice. Including this job.” Reflecting on her time with the de Blasio administration. (We like Maya!)
Maya Wiley gets the United Healthcare Workers East SEIU Local 1199 endorsement!
Don’t forget about SPV Community Folder
CD-31 Special Election
Important Dates
02.23 Election Day for Special Election, CD-31 (Queens)
03.13-03.21 Early Voting for Special Election,CD 11 & 15 (Bronx)
03.23 Special Election: CD 11 & 15 (Bronx)
Put something on our radar! Comment below or drop us an email at softpowervote@gmail.com