policing

Host Austin Davis is joined by Chief Shawn Burke of the South Burlington Police Department.

For more information: lccvermont.org

From the organizer:

FreeHer VT | Cooperation Vermont | Peoples Network for Land and Liberation | Food Not Cops | People’s Kitchen

In response to the National Call to Action from the Stop Cop City Coalition in Atlanta, GA, activists in Vermont rally and hold a press conference in solidarity, directed at Cox Enterprises to immediately divest from Cop City and cease their fundraising activities.

The City of Atlanta has leased 381 acres of Weelaunee Forest (the last substantial green space in the Atlanta area) to the Atlanta Police Foundation for a militarized police training facility funded by corporations. At the price of 90 million dollars, it includes a mock city to practice urban warfare, tear gas and explosives testing, dozens of shooting ranges, and a Black Hawk helicopter landing pad. Supported by the Atlanta Committee for Progress, which is composed of over 40 corporate elites including the CEOs of Coca-Cola, Home Depot and Cox, its aim is to further the surveillance of the population, stifling decent, and gentrification of the city.

Jim (Fergie) Cox Chambers, Jr. speaks out on March 9th in Burlington against his family company’s (Cox Enterprises) direct involvement in the private fundraising efforts for Cop City.

Cox Enterprises owns Dealer.Com in Burlington

https://www.stopcopcitysolidarity.org/

From VICII:

People for Police Accountability is a grassroots movement currently campaigning to create an independent Community Control Board to oversee our local police, with both investigative and disciplinary authority. The change will be before voters this Town Meeting Day, on March 7th, 2023. People for Police Accountability advances the idea that police must be held accountable to the community they serve. "We are fighting for this change in Burlington, Vermont due to very well documented instances of police misconduct within the Burlington police department", says the pro-charter change group.

To help inform your vote on this crucial and divisive issue, The Vermont Institute of Community and International Involvement (VICII) will sponsor a two-episode series of discussions.

On the 15th of February, Councilor Gene Bergman presents the pro argument in this ballot item.
On the 22nd of February, Councilor Ben Traverse articulates the opposing views.                     

For more information: vicii.org

From the organizer:

We are in the midst of multiple crises in our city, state, and country. The answer from both corporate parties seems to be more policing and more prisons instead of funding social services, education, jobs, and programs to overcome racial injustice.

Here in Burlington, Mayor Weinberger clamors to hire more police. And the state government is in the process of building 4 new prisons at the cost of $230 million. Such measures only enforce racial and class inequalities not redress them.

Come hear local activists speak out against this expansion of the carceral state, and lay out concrete alternatives for funding services - not police and prisons!

Speakers:
Jayna Asaf, Free Her Vermont
Jessica Laporte, People for Police Accountability
Paul Fleckenstein, Tempest Collective
Katie Harris, AFSCME 1674

Sponsored by: Tempest Collective, Free Her Vermont, & People for Police Accountability, AFSCME 1674.