Real Change is back in fighting condition.
The Real Change community has been thinking a lot about our activism lately. We're nearing the completion of our strategic plan, and, as we've asked what our friends value and the times demand, organizing lands somewhere near the top of the heap.
This probably doesn't surprise anyone.
A few months ago, we won the 2010 Seattle Human Rights Award for our role in stopping last year's aggressive panhandling legislation. More recently we've been in deep on the Tent City issue and in working with other allies to stop the money-sucking hole in the ground known as the tunnel. Not so long ago, we led the coalition that put the brakes on a new municipal jail, which you'll remember as Seattle's previous "unstoppable" public policy disaster. It's kind of what we do.
But need to do better. We've been organizing with one hand tied behind our back.
Many of you will recall 2008-2009 as the years in which we became the victims of our own growth. When the City of Seattle started targeting homeless campers for removal, we organized our asses off to push back. At the same time, amid the recession and cuts to social programs, our vendor numbers went through the roof. We were left fighting -- first to keep up, and then to survive.
In 2009, we faced down crisis by eliminating our organizer position and investing in infrastructure and operations. The idea was that we'd tend to our core, get healthy for the long run, and add the organizer position back in when resources allowed. The strategy worked. We're back and ready to kick butt in the name of economic justice.
While doing the homeless sweeps work, we experimented with a grassroots organizing model that mirrors our greatest strength as an organization: the vast network of relationships that Real Change creates across class. Solid organizing is about finding mutual self-interest, building authentic relationships and transcending difference. Our compassion and caring for each other is the glue that carries us across hard times toward hope.
We know this because we've been there. All those protest camps we did at Fourth and James were our own little taste of the beloved community we're out to create. We're going back, stronger than ever, as soon as we can.