|
Overview of Projects
Movement
Building, Public Policy, and Publications for Clean Air, Mass Transit,
Civil Rights, & Environmental Justice
Founded in 1989, the Strategy Center is a multiracial "think-tank/act-tank"
based in Los Angeles County working to impact national and international
public policy and mass movements from a regional base of 10 million
people. The Center builds multiracial social movements and broad
coalitions, trains young community organizers, and develops publications
at the intersection of ecology, civil rights, mass transit, workers'
and immigrants' rights. We organize front line, big picture grassroots
campaigns that train thousands of members in three languages, English,
Spanish, and Korean, to directly challenge the ideology and power
of transnational corporations and government elites. Our work addresses
the totality of urban life, with a primary focus on the needs and
interests of low-income people, women, immigrants, youth, people
with disabilities, and people of color, and from that base reaches
out to all classes in society.
Bus Riders Union/Sindicato de Pasajeros
The largest
mass transportation grassroots organization in the U.S. with 200
community leaders, 3,500 dues members, 50,000 supporters on the
buses. The BRU takes on some of L.A.'s most powerful corporate and
government forces to build world-class, clean-fuel, bus-centered
mass transit in the most air-polluted and auto-addicted region in
the U.S.
Demands
- 50 cent fare
and $20 unlimited-use monthly bus pass
- Accesible
$10 student bus pass
- Double the
current 2,300 bus fleet to 4,600
- Bus-only
lanes on L.A.'s freeways and major streets
- Moratorium
on all rail & freeway construction
- Unionized
transit work force & an elected MTA board
Victories
- 10-year civil
rights, federal Consent Decree against L.A.'s Metropolitan Transportation
Authority (MTA) establishing the BRU as class representative of
400,000 bus riders; has won more than $1 billion in bus improvements.
- 2,100 new
Compressed Natural Gas buses replacing diesel buses (L.A. now
has the largest CNG bus fleet in the U.S.) and 300 new expansion
buses
- 1200 new
unionized driver and mechanic jobs
- Monthly unlimited
bus pass saved from elimination, reduced to $42, and creation
of a weekly $11 pass, no fare increases for eight years
The
National School for Strategic Organizing
Over 65 young
organizers have completed the rigorous 6-month, full time program
since 1991 and dozens of BRU members have completed the new evening
and weekend leadership development program. The emphasis is on theory-driven
practice taught through on-the-bus organizing, mentoring with senior
organizers, and classroom discussion, readings, and writing assignments.
We train "long distance runners" who will commit years
and hopefully a lifetime to highly professional and effective organizing
work.
- Developing
a new generation of class-conscious, antiracist, antisexist, internationalist
organizers
- Teaching
organizers to initiate demands, build a leadership core, develop
community allies
- Building
campaigns to organize new, independent social movements
- Learning
to assess different phases of a campaign: when to escalate, when
to retreat, how to consolidate gains and victories
- Understanding
the relationship of short-term tactics to long-term strategy
Political
Education Department and Publications
Strategy Center
Publications-building an independent publishing house, primarily
with our own books, articles, and films on movement building, analysis,
strategy, and tactical orientation. We target the "opinion
leaders of the oppressed"-community activists and organizers
in environmental, social justice and other progressive organizations,
shop floor activists in both union and non-union workplaces, policymakers,
university students, and activist teachers and intellectuals-people
who are "fighting the good fight" but are in urgent need
of theoretical and political direction and challenge.
AhoraNow,
an International Bilingual (English and Spanish) Political Magazine
- Targets the
"opinion leaders of the oppressed"—community activists
in environmental, social justice and other progressive organizations,
shop floor activists in both union and non-union workplaces, and
activist intellectuals, who are "fighting the good fight"
but are in urgent need of theoretical and political direction
and challenge.
- National
and international subscribership is approximately one thousand.
Clean
Air Clean Lungs Clean Buses & Stop Climate Change
A new project
focusing on long-term and structural demands to dramatically decrease
the public health injuries to children and low-income urban communities
due to L.A.'s toxic air pollution through major cuts in auto and
diesel truck use and expansion of clean-fuel, bus-centered mass
transit.
Demands
- Reduce L.A.'s
cars from 8 million to 4 million
- Going far
beyond Kyoto to a 50% reduction in all greenhouse gas emissions
- Double the
average mileage of autos, especially SUVs, in California (and
the U.S.) from 25 mpg to 50 mpg within a decade
- Auto free
zones to dramatically reduce auto congestion and pollution
- Phase out
all diesel buses
Center
for Transportation Strategies
A new Strategy
Center project to expand our regional and national transportation
work.
Objectives
- Creating
a regional network of grassroots organizations at the intersection
of environmental justice and mass transit
- Strategy
Center Visiting Organizers Program
- Facilitating
participation in campaigns such as ISTEA/TEA-21 reauthorization
and other legislative and policy projects
- Initiating
a major movement and strategy conference in February 2005: The
Future of Transportation.
Community
Rights Campaign
A new Strategy
Center campaign focusing on defeating reactionary anti-civil rights
and anti-immigrant propositions, and the criminal injustice system
with a primary emphasis on the racialization and feminization of
poverty, and the criminalization of communities of color.
Objectives
- Expanding
voter registration, turnout, and protection work against reactionary
propositions
- Stop the
L.A. MTA transit court strategy to increase revenues using fines
that criminalizing bus riders for eating, playing music, or fare
evading
- Shut down
all California Youth Authority facilities
- Stop regressive
sales taxes to fund more police and prison construction
- Voting rights
reauthorization (2007) and reversing felony disenfranchisement
Voice
from the Frontlines Radio Show
Tune in to our
radio show, Voices from the Frontlines, on 90.7 FM KPFK. Airs every
Monday from 4-5pm or streaming on the web at www.kpfk.org.
|
