Update: The Berkeley City Council had a lengthy and contentious meeting that ended with arrests. Here is a Media Alliance op-ed and the meeting video is available here if you have six hours to kill.
Oakland law firm Siegel and Yee sent a cure and correct letter after the meeting ended in a police riot, but has yet to initiate litigation.
The upshot is that the City of Berkeley reiterated an “intention” to eventually pull out of Urban Shield, but failed to actually do so. CM Ben Bartlett says he is assembling a blue ribbon commission to address Berkeley’s participation in Urban Shield.
For the latest Power Point presentation about the police militarization exercise prepared by the Alameda County Sheriffs Office, click here.
On June 20, 2017, the Berkeley City Council will consider (for the 4th time in 2017 and the 6th time in the last two years, whether to pull out of the police militarization expo.
Join us at Longfellow Middle School at 1500 Derby Street in Berkeley to see if history will be made with the first California city getting on the record in opposition to the militarization of local law enforcement.
See below for the Stop Urban Shield Coalition’s report, and videos of Urban Shield exercises and SWAT exercises.
Update 2-20-17. At the January 25 meeting of the SF Board of Supervisors Budget and Finance Committee, (SF is the fiscal sponsor for all Bay Area UASI grants including the one that pays for Urban Shield), Supervisor Malia Cohen commented: “The point that I am trying to make is I feel a certain sense of responsibility as the fiscal agent to take the claims that we are hearing seriously.. As you have seen on the news there are substantial protests and unrest of how [Alameda County] are using their dollars. If we are the fiscal agent…you intercede, you kind of step in to ask questions, and it sounds like to me that we have not been asking any questions. We have just been shirking our responsibility.” The committee then sent on the funding request with “no recommendation”. The full Board of Supervisors has continued the item to February 28, so the grant remains unapproved. Momentum is building!
John Lindsay-Poland and Linda Sanchez of American Friends Service Committee wrote about the recent Urban Shield developments for 48 Hills.
Update 1-11-2017 : At the January 10 Alameda County Board of Supervisors meeting after many hours of public comment with over 100 speakers signed up, the board adopted 12 principles for the militarized policing expo including eliminating racist vendors, eliminating assault weapons transactions, ending foreign participation from countries with documented human rights violations, and no crowd control or surveillance training. They also created a task force to monitor implementation of the 12 principles.
**
After three years of growing protests and an eviction from the Oakland Marriot, the Stop Urban Shield Coalition blocked the entrances to the event on September 9th in Pleasanton.
In 2014, the annual police militarization carnival had its exposition evicted from the Oakland Marriot after a large protest at Oscar Grant Plaza and the relocation of Congresswoman Barbara Lee’s fundraising event from the hotel.
In 2015, hundreds protested at the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office to say stop militarizing public safety.
The Berkeley Police Review Commission came within one vote of recommending the removal of the city’s SWAT team from the event.
The Associated Students at UC Berkeley passed a resolution asking the administration not to send the campus police force to the event.
In 2016, 3 entrances were blocked at the Exposition’s new location at the Pleasanton Fairgrounds, delaying the start of the weapons expo and making front page news coverage all around the Bay Area. Twenty three people were arrested.
In 2017?
The Stop Urban Shield Coalition produced this report for the Alameda County Board of Supervisors about the community impact of the event and alternatives for public health and safety training that are demilitarized and free of racist narratives.