Police again approached Food Not Bombs asking for a permit, but let the group continue serving when given a letter from the ACLU

On Monday, October 5th, community groups including the Virginia Highland Church, BLOCS (Building Locally to Organize for Community Safety), ATAC (Atlantans Together Against Crime), as well as representatives from the Atlanta Police Department held a forum to discuss the police department's recent raid on the Atlanta Eagle, a prominent gay nightclub.

Expectations of a genuinely open and forthcoming discussion were lowered at the very beginning when police refused to discuss the incident at all, preferring instead to have a dialogue around more general issues of policy and tolerance in the police department.

Jeff Graham, executive director of Georgia Equality set the tone of the discussion early by placing the Atlanta Eagle raid in the context of 70 years of police harassment and targetting of GLBT social venues. He pointed out that police vice units have been used throughout the past century as a way to persecute GLBT gatherings. "We want to feel like equal citizens, not targets in our own communities."

Forum attendees were especially interested in the role of the Red Dog Unit, a special police unit which is trained as a SWAT team and uses especially aggressive tactics. Police representatives said the Red Dogs were formed in the 1990s as a response to increased gang activity, and are currently used mostly to deal with so-called "open air drug markets". Despite repeated criticism of the decision to send a SWAT force to the Eagle, police representatives were unapologetic, saying that the Red Dogs are specially trained for this type of operation and are very well disciplined. One attendee asked "Who is policing the Red Dogs?"

Stop Foreclosures
End Homelessness

Sept. 20-21
Noon - Morning
City Hall
68 Mitchell St. SW

Poor people are under attack in Atlanta. With foreclosures out of control and homelessness on the rise, the city government has responded with a campaign of harassment towards the homeless and service providers.

The Metro Atlanta Task Force for the Homeless is the most recent victim of a deliberate effort by the city to disrupt emergency services for the homeless. On June 22 the city turned off the water at the Task Force’s Peachtree Pine shelter for homeless men, leaving 575 people with no access to showers, sinks or toilets.

Don't let these injustices go unchallenged! Join us as we camp out in front of City Hall to demand justice for poor people and support the Task Force in their lawsuit against the city on Sept. 21st.

Program includes community discussion, food, and music.