BY ZACH WILLIAMS | In response to rising sea levels and climate change’s other effects, more than 100 activist groups converged in Lower Manhattan on Monday to promote environmental justice as part of Flood Wall Street.
Police preemptively blocked streets leading to the New York Stock Exchange, but about 1,000 activists succeeded in blocking Broadway for about eight hours at its intersection with Morris St. before extending the demonstration to include the intersection with Wall St., as well.
“People gonna rise like water. We’re gonna calm this crisis down,” went one prominent slogan from the march. “I hear the voice of my great granddaughter saying shut down Wall St. now.”
In contrast to many past protests, police officers largely left the demonstrators alone while at the same time preventing them from penetrating further into the Financial District. Some demonstrators suspected that Mayor de Blasio was behind the surprisingly restrained police presence.
“I think people seem happy and engaged. The police don’t seem to be too bossy,” said Joanna Burgess, a Battery Park City resident.
She said she saw neighborhood residents that morning seemingly dressed for Flood Wall Street.
About 100 arrests — including of an activist dressed as a polar bear — were made at about 7 p.m. after police moved in to clear the street.
The event followed the People’s Climate March the day before, which drew hundreds of thousands of activists, political leaders and celebrities to Midtown. Most in Flood Wall Street took part in that demonstration, some remaining in town one more day in order to participate in direct action against the financial industry, which they charge, enables a global system of inequality, as well as global warming itself.
“I’m very concerned about climate change, and Wall St. is part of the problem,” said Cara Jennings, a Florida resident who came to New York, her toddler in tow, for the protests. “This is where the financing comes from for oil extraction and pipelines, so we have to convince Wall St. to solve the climate problem.”
The group assembled in the morning at Battery Park to the tunes of the Rude Mechanical Orchestra, the local activist marching band. Author / activist Naomi Klein told the crowd that climate change’s consequences must continue to inspire activists who came together three years ago for Occupy Wall Street.
“We are powered by the knowledge that the same system of short-term profit and deregulated greed that deepens inequality and forecloses on homes is the very same system that is foreclosing on our collective home,” Klein said. “We never went away. We were organizing in our communities and now we are back with the power of water behind us.”
While activists originally planned to stage a sit-in in front of the stock exchange, they did so on Broadway instead.
Several vehicles were caught in the mass protest for at least an hour before being let through.
“I didn’t plan on it, but it’s a good cause,” said Sean Vander from an automobile stalled at the intersection of Morris St. and Broadway just a few doors down from his destination at 25 Broadway.
Residents trying to enter Wall St. were told by police to walk several blocks north in order to get home.
As the sit-in continued, some activists grew weary with the tedium of occupation. The group’s numbers dwindled by half by late afternoon. Scuffles with police broke out when some protesters tried to swarm the police defense of Wall St. Police pushed back, smacked hands holding onto metal crowd-control barriers and pepper-sprayed several protesters and a journalist before things settled down. Protesters bounced around a 25-foot-tall “carbon ball,” but police eventually deflated it.
Demonstrators for the most part remained seated, discussing environmental issues among themselves. Later, some would draw chalk doodles on the street and play soccer. One demonstrator watching a game said such activities promote more free use of public space in a city known for its consumer culture.
“This is a space in which we don’t see relaxation very often,” said Jason, who declined to give a last name. “That creates an energy that is helpful.”
But some protesters, and onlookers, said hours of sitting on Broadway was not effective enough in inspiring more people to put pressure on Wall St. firms to confront global warming.
“I thought it was supposed to be about economic inequality and laying some plans for some kind of coherent action that could be taken on a political level,” said Eric Rassi, a resident of E. 10th St. and a former squatter. “But there’s nothing being discussed here, as far as I can see, on a political level at all. So, obviously this is not a movement that is going to be a political force. It’s going to be playtime politics.”
