Socialism Wins In DC

The post Socialism Wins In DC appeared first on Metro DC Democratic Socialists of America.

by Jean Allen

Never protested a day in my life

You wont hear me whining

Yeah ill work overtime for time and a half

Time and a quarter

Time and time

Im tough

The way americans are tough

I can take it, a layoff a dead loved one or anything besides 

An incorrect order from a lesser

Im tough

The way a mule is tough

My back can bear any burden

I can live with black mold and not say a thing 

I can be killed slowly or quietly

After all why be a bother, why ask anything

Of a society that gives nothing but reasons to be tough

Im tough

I can wake up to images of dead kids and not feel a thing 

Im so tough it doesnt even matter what color the kids are anymore

I just hope

That when I grind my set to dust

That heaven isnt downsizing

The post The American Spirit first appeared on Rochester Red Star.

Political violence is intensifying. A new series of trainings prepares socialists to keep themselves and their communities safe.

The post Stop the Bleed appeared first on Democratic Left.

Results in Tuesday's election — and a preview of DSA's huge slate of candidates on the ballot next Tuesday in Maryland, New York and Utah.

The post LIVE BLOG: LEWIS GEORGE WINS MAYOR RACE appeared first on Democratic Left.

Events & Actions

Tuesday June 16 (6:30 PM – 7:30 PM) Ecosocialist Bi-Weekly Meeting (zoom and in person at 1916 McAllister)

Wednesday June 17 (5:30 PM – 7:30 PM) Affordable Housing Guarantee Act Phone Banking (in person at 1916 McAllister St)

Thursday June 18 (6:00 PM – 7:00 PM)  Education Board Open Meeting  (zoom)

Thursday June 18 (7:00 PM – 8:00 PM) Immigrant Justice regular meeting (zoom and in person at 1916 McAllister St)

Friday June 19 (9:30 AM – 10:30 AM)  District 1 Coffee with Comrades (in person at 2 Clement St)

Friday June 19 (4:00 PM – 6:00 PM) Guarantee Act Petition Dropoff/Pickup (in person at 3368 19th St)

Saturday June 20 (12:00 PM – 5:00 PM) 2026 Chapter Convention (Day 1) (Hybrid) (zoom and in person at Kelly Cullen Community, 220 Golden Gate Ave)

Sunday June 21 (11:00 AM – 1:00 PM) Guarantee Act Mobilization at Clement (in person at 152 Clement St)

Sunday June 21 (12:00 PM – 5:00 PM) 2026 Chapter Convention (Day 2) (Hybrid) (zoom and in person at Kelly Cullen Community, 220 Golden Gate Ave)

Sunday June 21 (5:00 PM – 6:00 PM)  Tenderloin Healing Circle Working Group (zoom)

Monday June 22 (6:00 PM – 8:00 PM)  Tenderloin Healing Circle (in person at Kelly Cullen Community, 220 Golden Gate Ave)

Monday June 22 (7:00 PM – 8:00 PM) Labor Board – Flex Meeting (zoom)

Monday June 22 (6:00 PM – 8:00 PM)  Tenderloin Healing Circle (in person at 220 Golden Gate Ave)

Monday June 22 (7:00 PM – 8:00 PM) Labor Board – Flex Meeting (zoom)

Tuesday June 23 (5:30 PM – 7:00 PM) Social Housing Working Group (in person at 1916 McAllister St )

Tuesday June 23 (6:00 PM – 7:30 PM)  What Is DSA? (in person at 451 Jersey St)

Tuesday June 23 (7:00 PM – 8:00 PM)  Public Transit Meeting (zoom and in person at 1916 McAllister St)

Wednesday June 24 (6:45 PM – 8:30 PM) Tenant Organizing Working Group Meeting (zoom and in person at 1916 McAllister St)

Thursday June 25 (6:30 PM – 7:30 PM) Public Bank Project Meeting (zoom)

Friday June 26 (7:00 PM – 9:00 PM) Maker Friday (in person at 1916 McAllister St)

Saturday June 27 (2:00 PM – 4:00 PM) Socialist Shop Talk (in person at 1916 McAllister St)

Sunday June 28 (1:00 PM – 2:30 PM)  What Is DSA? (in person at 1916 McAllister St)

Monday June 29 (7:00 PM – 8:00 PM) Labor Board – New Union Organizing (zoom and in person at 1916 McAllister St)

Check out https://dsasf.org/events for more events and updates.

Ways to Support Affordable Housing Guarantee Act

The Affordable Housing Guarantee Act is officially accepting contributions! This is a grassroots, community-led campaign, and we need whatever you’re able spare to help us protect our affordable housing funds and tax the rich! Head to fairhousingsf.com/donate to donate!

If you’re not in a position to donate at the moment, we can still use your help gathering signatures. Head to fairhousingsf.com/events to find a volunteer event near you!

Socialist Shop Talk

Come chat with comrades about socialism through the lens of current events! In this new series, we will read a short text together, then discuss and analyze it from a socialist point of view.

This is a low-key environment where comrades can develop their skills of applying socialist analysis to current events, while having an outlet to discuss and process everything that’s happening in the world together. This event is open to all, whether you’re socialism-curious, new to DSA, or a longtime member.

In this post-primary election session, we’ll discuss an article written by a DSA SF comrade discussing the role of electoral politics in progressing toward and winning socialism.

When: Saturday, June 27th, 2-4PM

Where: 1916 McAllister St

RSVP here

EWOC Fundamentals of Workplace Organizing Course

Sign up here!

EWOC holds a regular training course to help you build your union from the ground up alongside workers in your industry. It doesn’t require an organizing background to understand the material, which covers topics including mapping and charting, building an organizing committee, uniting over common concerns, and how to take action. If you’re interested in becoming any level of organizer for EWOC, this course is mandatory.

This course will in person at the DSA office (1916 McAllister). We’ll watch the EWOC lecture together and then go through the discussion activities. If you can’t make all of the sessions, reach out to Caitlin Stanton (SF EWOC local lead coordinator) for accommodations.

SCHEDULE:
Week 1: Developing Leadership
Tuesday, July 14 (7-8:30PM)

Week 2: The Organizing Conversation
Tuesday, July 21 (7-8:30PM)

Week 3: The Arc of the Campaign
Tuesday, July 28 (7-8:30PM)

Week 4: Inoculation and the Boss Campaign
Tuesday, August 4 (7-8:30PM)

Democratic Left interviews New York State Assembly Member and congressional candidate Claire Valdez as part of a series of interviews with members of New York City DSA’s insurgent slate.

The post Claire Valdez Is Taking the Labor Movement to Congress appeared first on Democratic Left.

In 2007, 34 years into the team’s 53-year drought, a DSA activist put forward a radical solution.

The post Now More Than Ever, Socialize the Knicks appeared first on Democratic Left.

by Elizabeth Henderson

As temperatures seesaw and heavy rains cause Lake Ontario levels to swell, Rochester is releasing the final draft of the revised Zoning code for public scrutiny. How humans behave in each little locality adds up for the whole planet. The city of Rochester has high hopes that the new code will enable Rochester to meet the 2034 Comprehensive Plan goals for positive “Placemaking,” resilience and sustainability. Rochester 2034 is the city’s future land use plan with detailed maps and written policies on how land should be managed and how development should occur within the City. The new zoning code is supposed to take this policy as its base, and provide a set of development regulations. There are many complex issues involved in zoning – I only feel competent to reflect on how the zoning relates to community gardens, urban farms and city-wide landscape maintenance.

Reading through this ZAP draft, I was pleased to discover that the definition of community gardens matches up with the comments submitted by the Urban Agriculture Working Group. Earlier drafts took the word gardening hyper literally to mean only the activities of seeding, planting, nurturing and harvesting plants, leaving out anything else that went on in a garden – gardeners sitting at a table to chat, children playing in a sand box. The new definition recognizes the full scope of what a garden can be: “Community Garden. An operation in which residents grow food and/or ornamental plants and create community-building spaces. Produce is consumed by local households or donated to community organizations. Community gardens may offer a small amount of their product to be sold to support garden operation costs, but no onsite permanent structure is used for sales. Community gardens may include small-scale composting systems, low tunnels and temporary season extension equipment, water barrels, and other catchment/irrigation systems.” Now we just have to push to make sure that ZAP classifies gardens as permitted in all residential neighborhoods.

The new definition of Urban Farm is similarly comprehensive.

Where the ZAP falls short is in the restrictions on what gardeners or farmers can use to extend the season. From out of some hat, the zoners pulled the limit for greenhouses at 144 square feet (12 by 12).  All existing greenhouses on community gardens would be out of compliance. ZAP similarly restricts the space allocated for greenhouses, high tunnels (also known as hoop houses) and even low tunnels to 25% of the lot size.  With climate change, in the Northeast rains are more frequent and come down much harder.  Using high tunnels is a way to protect crops from pounding rain, so gardeners or urban farmers might justifiably want to cover as much as 75% of their land in order to have a crop.

The ZAP should also distinguish between greenhouses and high tunnels on the one hand, and low tunnels and row covers on the other. None of these structures is permanent. They are production aids that help growers extend the season. A greenhouse or high tunnel requires significant effort to erect and stays up for a few seasons or more. But a skilled gardener can erect a low tunnel or put row covers over plants in a very short time and might leave them up for only a few days to protect tender plants from a frost or an invading pest or disease. The ZAP should get rid of these arbitrary limits.

Oddly, the ZAP allows urban farms to keep fowl and goats, but no other animals.  It is reasonable to restrict livestock to smaller breeds, but why not rabbits, guinea pigs and other small mammals? While allowing aquaculture, ZAP does not list fish. The ZAP only allows chicken manure in compost, but no other animal manures.

There is extensive research on the environmental injustice that low-income people are exposed to way more toxins in their living environment than wealthier people.  Lead paint, dust, contamination from incinerators, and factories located deliberately in neighborhoods where residents have fewer resources to defend themselves. Scientific studies associate exposure to pesticides with asthma, cancer, developmental and learning disabilities, nerve and immune system damage, Parkinson’s disease, liver or kidney damage, reproductive impairment, birth defects, and disruption of the endocrine system. Infants, children, pregnant women, the elderly, people with compromised immune systems, and chemical sensitivities are especially vulnerable to pesticide effects and exposure. Pesticides are harmful to pets, wildlife, soil microbiology, plants, and natural ecosystems. 

The ZAP section on landscaping offers the opportunity to limit the use of toxic herbicides and pesticides in the city. Section E, on maintenance states: “All landscaping must be maintained free from disease, pests, weeds, and litter.”  This is the place to insert – “without the use of carcinogenic or endocrine-disrupting herbicides or pesticides.”  The Monroe County Parks, including city parks, already have strict limits on the use of toxics only for invasive species or serious diseases. The know-how is local! The Parks Department can offer technical assistance.

The current garden permit also limits toxics: “I/We agree to not use pesticides, including Round-Up, without a current New York State Pesticide License and that all New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and Monroe County laws must be followed.”

Rochester 2034 devotes a section to community gardens and urban farms which includes (p. 321) a fine list of the positive qualities beyond growing plants that gardens provide. The plan also quotes emphatic comments from residents who filled out a survey and attended community discussions (full disclosure – I was one of them), calling for more community gardens and reduced regulatory burdens on gardeners (p. 323). The Action Plan (UAG 1b) states: “Make changes to the Zoning Code that allow urban agriculture as a principal use within specified parameters.”

Along with amending the zoning, the city needs to change the system for garden permits.  Despite the enthusiastic charge from the public in 2034, city garden permits include the right of the city to revoke the permit to sell the land to developers. The permit includes the clause: “I/We acknowledge and agree that said permit may be revoked by the City of Rochester at any time, and agree that notice by certified letter addressed to the address set forth in this Permit shall be sufficient notice of such revocation.”

To better align with Rochester 2034, the city should adopt zoning that clusters development more densely along transit corridors, then the city can designate vacant lots that are not on these corridors for use as greenspace and gardens. Each quadrant should get some. Half the city’s 5000 vacant lots are city property which it spends $260 a piece each year to keep “clean and green.” The city saves money when residents take over. The city can divide lots into two distinct categories that are clearly labeled as reserved for future development or reserved for use as gardens, farms or green space. Gardeners will know that if they put in a lot of work and investments, their garden won’t face a city bulldozer.

In June, there will be one last chance for people to submit comments before City Council adopts the finalized zoning code. The City Planning Commission will host two informational meetings: June 8 and June 10 at 5:30 at City Hall where people can offer comments or submit them in writing to PlanningCommission@CityofRochester.Gov in advance of either meeting.

The post Getting Grounded: Comments on ZAP (the Rochester Zoning Alignment Project) first appeared on Rochester Red Star.

Expression of Disapproval – Burbank City Council Budget Flock Inclusion

On June 2nd, after receiving a multitude of constituent comments objecting to the renewal of the City of Burbank’s $250,000 contract with Flock Safety, the Burbank City Council voted unanimously to pass the city budget unamended, resulting in the renewal of the contract with Flock. This included DSA endorsed Socialist in Office Burbank City Council Member Konstantine Anthony.

DSA-LA and many other chapters of DSA have opposed Flock contracts in our cities, and the DSA-LA Immigration Justice Committee currently has an ongoing campaign to end Flock contracts in Los Angeles. Flock routinely shares data with DHS and ICE, breaking sanctuary ordinances and California State Law in the process, and has a proven track history of extreme data vulnerabilities and violations of their own privacy policies. Flock cameras have been used to track immigrants, women seeking abortions, and even in one instance to access cameras in a children’s gymnastics room. The bottom line: “Flock Safety” is not safe.

DSA Los Angeles strongly disagrees with the council member’s vote. As an avowed socialist, Council Member Anthony should have cast a vote of principled opposition to the use of public funds to surveil working class residents. At the same meeting, the council member was targeted for censure for organizing opposition to a Moms of Liberty, a hate group’s, anti-trans event in Burbank. We understand that this motion put him in a difficult position to take a position of courage – however, the expectation of our SiOs is to take positions of conviction, especially when the community demands it.

The struggle for socialism, multiracial democracy, and immigration justice continues. We are in communication with Council Member Anthony about actions to make amends going forward, and will work with him in the future to build a Burbank for all.