Faces of Foreclosure
WHAT: “Faces of Foreclosure”
WHERE: Macalester College, Weyerheauser Memorial Chapel
WHEN: Tuesday, April 17, 2012 at 7:00pm
Occupy Mac is hosting an event titled "Faces of Foreclosure" in our campus chapel. It will be an informative and inspirational event featuring Monique White who is a homeowner fighting eviction, global justice and labor activist Gerardo Cajamarca, and nationally recognized hip-hop artist Brother Ali.
Members of Occupy Mac at Macalester are dedicated to fighting the foreclosure crisis that is devastating to families and entire communities. In North Minneapolis 51% of homeowners are currently being threatened with foreclosure. This largescale crisis is not the fault of individual homeowners who have made their payments for years; it all comes back to the huge financial
institutions that are making record profits by evicting people from their homes.
One of the purposes of the event is to kick off a campus campaign to cut all relations Macalester has with Wells Fargo unless they agree to principal reduction on all underwater-mortgages in the Twin Cities metro area. We will be looking for ways to expand our campaign to other campuses and organizations as well as collaborate with similar efforts to cut the Minneapolis Public School District's contracts with Wells Fargo. This event will be an exciting campaign starter that nobody should miss!
Speaker bios:
Brother Ali has received national recognition for his work as an artist and community activist. He will
talk about his personal involvement with Occupy Homes MN and how foreclosures are affecting the
Twin Cities. Learn more at http://www.brotherali.com/ , and check out his foreclosure-specific work
here: http://midwestbroadcast.blogspot.com/2012/03/brother-ali-joins-occupy-ho...
Monique White is a single mother from North Minneapolis. Since losing her job as a youth counselor
due to state budget cuts, she has been struggling to make mortgage payments on her underwater home.
She has been fighting eviction, and US Bank continues to refuse to negotiate with her. More about her
story: http://vimeo.com/31770485
Gerardo Cajamarca has lived in Minnesota on political asylum from Colombia since 2003, and is a
member of SEIU Local 26. He will speak about the connections between the foreclosure crisis,
international finance, and immigration issues. He also writes for the Huffington Post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gerardo-cajamarca-alarc
More info:
Another important aspect of this event is that it is part of a larger local and national movement. Neighborhoods Organizing for Change is running a campaign encouraging the Minneapolis Schoolboard to divest from Wells Fargo: http://www.mnnoc.org/noc_calls_on_minneapolis_public_schools_to_divest_f...
There are also students working on this nationally. Macalester students have specifically been in touch with students from NYU, because they are running their campaign with a similar structure to ours. Read some of their coverage in The Nation: http://www.thenation.com/blog/167117/students-push-nyusever-
ties-jp-morgan-chase
This event will not only tell important narratives of foreclosure, but will also be the exciting kick-off of a new student movement in the Twin Cities. Nobody should miss it!