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Great Wall Institute: The Process of the Great Wall of Los Angeles

1986-87 Anti- Nuclear Protests

Die-in at student union, UMass Amherst, sometime in the late 1980s. During the academic year 1986-1987, the campus at UMass Amherst was a hotbed of political protest, fueled in part by the US intervention in Central America. The arrival on campus of a CIA recruiting officer in November set off a string of demonstrations that attracted the support of activists Abbie Hoffman and Amy Carter, daughter of former president Jimmy Carter. The occupation of the Whitmore Administration Building was followed by a larger occupation of adjacent Munson Hall, resulting in a number of arrests. Hoffman, Carter, and eleven co-defendants were tried and acquitted on charges of disorderly conduct were tried in April 1987

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1. 1982 Anti- nuclear Protests Upwards of one million people demonstrated in New York City's Central Park June 12, 1982 against nuclear weapons and for an end to the cold war arms race. It was the largest anti-nuclear protest in American history. On the morning of June 12, 1982, as the sun shined down on the green grass in Central Park, people began to gather carrying signs for nuclear disarmament. Throughout the morning, buses arrived from around the country. By the afternoon, nearly every blade of grass was covered. Citizens filled second, third, fifth, sixth, seventh, and Madison avenues. By mid-afternoon, the police estimated that over 750,000 people were in Central Park demanding an end to nuclear weapons. By the end of the day, that number had swelled to 1 million
2. 1986-87 Anti- Nuclear Protests Die-in at student union, UMass Amherst, sometime in the late 1980s. During the academic year 1986-1987, the campus at UMass Amherst was a hotbed of political protest, fueled in part by the US intervention in Central America. The arrival on campus of a CIA recruiting officer in November set off a string of demonstrations that attracted the support of activists Abbie Hoffman and Amy Carter, daughter of former president Jimmy Carter. The occupation of the Whitmore Administration Building was followed by a larger occupation of adjacent Munson Hall, resulting in a number of arrests. Hoffman, Carter, and eleven co-defendants were tried and acquitted on charges of disorderly conduct were tried in April 1987
3. 1983 General Accounting Office Conducts Study (Environmental Justice) Prompted by the 1982 Warren County sit-in, the United States General Accounting Office (GAO) conducted the study: Siting of Hazardous Waste Landfills and Their Correlation with Racial and Economic Status of Surrounding Communities (PDF). This study is said to have "galvanized the environmental justice movement and provided empirical support for the claims for environmental racism." GAO found that three out of four hazardous waste landfills examined were located in communities where African Americans made up at least twenty-six percent of the population, and whose family incomes were below the poverty level. This study used 1980 Census data.
4. 1982 Anti-nuclear protests
5. 1983 Publication of Solid Waste Sites and the Houston Black Community Dr. Robert Bullard (husband to Linda McKeever Bullard, the attorney for the plaintiffs in Bean v. Southwestern Waste Management, Inc.), conducted a first-of-its-kind study documenting the location of municipal waste disposal facilities in Houston. Solid Waste Sites and the Black Houston Community was the first comprehensive account of environmental racism in the United States. Bullard and his researchers found that African American neighborhoods in Houston were often chosen for toxic waste sites. All five city-owned garbage dumps, 80 percent of city-owned garbage incinerators, and 75 percent of privately owned landfills were sited in black neighborhoods, although African Americans made up only 25 percent of the city's population. (Original Caption) 10/21/1982-Afton, NC- Resembling civil rights demonstrators of the 1960's, blacks and whites march together in protest against a dump for toxic wastes. Many in this rural community contend Warren County was chosen as the site because most of its citizens are black and poor. Officials deny the question of race played any part in the selection. Front center is Reverend Joseph Lowery of Atlanta, who heads the Southern Christian Leadership Conference founded by the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Environmental advocates lost that battle—North Carolina ultimately buried the PCBs in Warren County—but the controversy crystallized the idea that the nation's environmental problems disproportionately burden its low-income people of color. Other communities of color had organized to oppose environmental threats before Warren County. In the early 1960s, Latino farm workers led by Cesar Chavez fought for workplace rights, including protection from harmful pesticides in the farm fields of California's San Joaquin Valley. In 1967, African-American students took to the streets of Houston to oppose a city garbage dump in their community that had claimed the life of a child. In 1968, residents of West Harlem, in New York City, fought unsuccessfully against a sewage treatment plant in their community. But the Warren County protests marked the first instance of an environmental protest by people of color garnering widespread national attention. The environmental justice movement's power only multiplied when the data began to roll in. At the behest of Congressman Walter Fauntroy, the Washington, D.C., delegate arrested during the North Carolina protests, the General Accounting Office in 1983 confirmed that hazardous waste sites in three southeastern states were disproportionately located near black communities. Four years later, the United Church of Christ produced a landmark report showing that three out of five Latino and black Americans lived near a toxic waste site.
6. 1983 A Movement Is Born: Environmental Justice and the UCC The Rev. Ben Chavis during a 1983 protest against the dumping of toxic waste. Photo by Ricky Stilley Through the leadership of Dollie Burwell, the Rev. Leon White, the Rev. Benjamin Chavis, Jr., and the UCC’s Commission for Racial Justice, the United Church of Christ served as the leading organizational force in the birth of the environmental justice movement. The story of how this movement arose begins in the late 1970s when a group of residents formed the Warren County Citizens Concerned (WCCC) and began to protest the state of North Carolina’s designation of a landfill in their county for the disposal of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), a toxic chemical substance whose production was banned by congress in 1979. With a population that was roughly 62% black, no other county in the state had a higher percentage of black residents, and only a few of the state’s one hundred counties could claim higher poverty rates. The placement of the landfill became to be regarded as an instance “environmental racism,” a phrase coined by Chavis. Photo Ricky Stilley While Chavis would ultimately take the helm of the UCC’s Commission for Racial Justice, it was White who served as the commission’s Executive Director when the WCCC first involved the group in its efforts. Both White and Chavis ultimately played leading roles in what became the watershed event in the launching of the movement. In September of 1982, the first trucks carrying PCB contaminated soil drove into Warren County but were met by hundreds of protestors who laid down on the highway to prevent their arrival. On the first day of action, 55 protestors were arrested. The protests lasted six weeks and were covered by the national media. By the end, 523 arrests were made. The attention garnered by the demonstrations in Warren County laid the foundation for more activism and consciousness-raising. In an article that appeared in the New Yorker, Chavis later recalled, “Warren County made headlines. And because it made headlines in the media, we began to get calls from other communities. But you know that in the eighties you couldn’t just say there was discrimination. You had to prove it.” Under the leadership of Chavis, the UCC’s Commission for Racial Justice issued its landmark 1987 report Toxic Wastes and Race in the United States. The study found that race rose to the top among variables associated with the location of a toxic waste facility. Three out of five Black and Hispanic Americans lived in a community that housed what the EPA called an “uncontrolled toxic waste site,” a closed or abandoned site that posed a threat to human health and the environment.
Contents of this path:
1. 1980s Restructuring and organized labor changes “Restructuring hit factories in southern Los Angeles and the San Fernando Valley especially hard; plant closures eliminated many unionized jobs. In south Los Angeles, eight major plants closed from 1975 to 1986, leaving 12,000 people out of work. More closures came as defense contracts ended in the 1990s – especially in aircraft and shipbuilding – with the end of the Cold War. In addition to these broad changes, the economic crisis of the mid-1970s and a rightward shift in politics further eroded the power of organized labor. Business went on an anti-labor offensive in the 1970s and 1980s, seeking to weaken the union movement. They were bolstered by anti-unionism at the federal level, led by President Ronald Reagan who set the tone. In 1981, he fired striking air traffic controllers and replaced them with non-union workers, and championed business deregulation. In emerging high- tech industries, like electronics assembly plants, as well, owners were anti-union and often fostered sweatshop-like conditions in their plants.” Excerpt from SurveyLA Citywide Historic Context Statement
2. 1980s UFW
3. 1983 General Accounting Office Conducts Study (Environmental Justice) Prompted by the 1982 Warren County sit-in, the United States General Accounting Office (GAO) conducted the study: Siting of Hazardous Waste Landfills and Their Correlation with Racial and Economic Status of Surrounding Communities (PDF). This study is said to have "galvanized the environmental justice movement and provided empirical support for the claims for environmental racism." GAO found that three out of four hazardous waste landfills examined were located in communities where African Americans made up at least twenty-six percent of the population, and whose family incomes were below the poverty level. This study used 1980 Census data.
4. 1983 In Today’s Headlines, Echoes of Central America’s Proxy Wars of the 1980s deadly conflicts in crowded Central American cities and dusty hamlets during the 1980s. Their effects are still felt today. Over the decades, several million Central America migrants have sought opportunity, refuge, and stability in the United States, driven by a mix of factors including battered economies, violence, corrupt governments, and the desire to reunite with relatives who emigrated earlier or to find a family-sustaining job. While media attention in recent years has focused on the arrival of unaccompanied minors and families, primarily from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, the lion’s share of the 3.8 million Central American immigrants in the United States as of 2019 have been in the country for at least a decade. Displacement and economic instability caused by regional civil wars, in which the U.S. government had involvement, led many Central Americans to migrate in the 1980s. The wars ended, but economic instability remained—as did migration. The Central American immigrant population in the United States more than tripled between 1980 and 1990. Hurricane Mitch in 1998 and two earthquakes in 2001 were among the factors further driving migration from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. Similar factors have remained at work in recent years. In November 2020, Hurricanes Eta and Iota devasted the region, affecting as many as 11 million people throughout Central America. Drought also has plagued parts of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras in what is known as the “Dry Corridor.” Further, government corruption, gang activity, and high homicide rates continue to affect parts of the region, driving emigration. The total Central American-born population in the United States has grown more than tenfold since 1980, and by 24 percent since 2010. The 3.8 million Central American immigrants present in 2019 accounted for 8 percent of the U.S. foreign-born population of 44.9 million.
5. 1986-87 Anti- Nuclear Protests Die-in at student union, UMass Amherst, sometime in the late 1980s. During the academic year 1986-1987, the campus at UMass Amherst was a hotbed of political protest, fueled in part by the US intervention in Central America. The arrival on campus of a CIA recruiting officer in November set off a string of demonstrations that attracted the support of activists Abbie Hoffman and Amy Carter, daughter of former president Jimmy Carter. The occupation of the Whitmore Administration Building was followed by a larger occupation of adjacent Munson Hall, resulting in a number of arrests. Hoffman, Carter, and eleven co-defendants were tried and acquitted on charges of disorderly conduct were tried in April 1987
6. 1987 LA River Encampment “By the 1980s, the homelessness situation was a crisis. Skid Row was full, and [those experiencing homelessness] were living throughout the city, with people and families living under freeways, by the beach, and along the Los Angeles River’s 51 miles. Due to the surge in the population, LA County and City took desperate measures, opening City Hall as a temporary housing site, and signing an emergency agreement for a temporary “urban campground” for hundreds in need. This campground was on 12 acres of land lining the LA River and approximately 2,600 people looked to this camp for housing solutions. Unfortunately, this riverside camp was deemed unsuccessful and closed months later.”
7. 1989 UNITE HERE Local 11 “UNITE HERE Local 11, currently representing over 32,000 hospitality workers in southern California and Arizona, has a long history in Los Angeles. The Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees (HERE) Local 11 brought together previously separate locals for waiters, waitresses, bartenders, cooks, and other hotel workers. In the 1970s and 1980s, the predominantly Spanish-speaking membership of Local 11 fought for fuller participation in their union against a largely Anglo leadership. In 1989, María Elena Durazo became the first Latina to lead a major Los Angeles union. She began reorienting the local towards greater membership participation and a more assertive stance with employers. Since then, Local 11 merged with locals in Santa Monica, Long Beach, and Orange County, and in 2016, with Local 631 in Arizona.”
8. Housing Overview smael Cazarez wearing serape and playing flute leading protest of housing demolition in Pico-Union neighborhood in Los Angeles, Calif., 1980 Hodge, Bill, December 15, 1980, Los Angeles Times - “In the decade following 1973, 4.5 million units were removed from the nation's housing stock, half of which was occupied by low-income households. In roughly the same period, over 1 million SRO units were lost, and the nation's public housing program was all but abandoned. It was replaced by the 'Section 8' rent-subsidy program that increased the residential location choice of recipients but only modestly increased the stock of affordable housing. Federal authorizations for housing subsidies amounted to 7 percent of the total budget in 1978; but by the late 1980s this proportion had shrunk to 0.7 percent. At the same time, the rise in single-person households dramatically increased the demand for housing across the nation. In Los Angeles and Southern California the consequence of these wider trends was a housing affordability crisis of unprecedented proportions. The proportion of households able to afford a median-priced home fell, and between 1974 and 1985, the number of housing units in L.A. County renting for $300 per month or less fell by 42 percent in real terms. In addition, the share of the total housing stock that was affordable fell from 35 percent in 1974 to 16 percent over the following decade. The number of poor renter households grew by 43,000 but the number of units they could technically afford fell by 60,000. Virtually no new public housing units were constructed during the 1980s, and between 1970 and 1989 market-rate housing unit growth in L.A. lagged at half the national rate.11”
9. 1980 - Ken Horne - CDC identifies first American Patient of the Aids Empidemic
10. Notable 1980s Labor History Events “1981 First Comparable Worth strike in United States, conducted by AFSCME Local 101 in San Jose; women achieve pay equity in city government jobs; 1981 President Ronald Reagan warns the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO) that he would fired every member if they struck. They did and he did, resulting in the termination of all 10,000 federal air traffic controllers. 1983 The Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) establishes local partnership from private and public employers who receive federal funds for job training and employment. Replaced the Comprehensive Employment and Training Act (CETA).”
11. UFW in the 1980s
14. 1981 Campaign to Keep GM Van Nuys Open Eric Mann describes organizing with Ed Asner (Actor): “...we initiated the Campaign to Keep GM Van Nuys Open in 1981 even before GM threatened to close our plant. We spent 2 years building a powerful coalition, we met with GM President F. James McDonald in 1984 as which time, shaken up by our real threat of a boycott of GM cars in the largest new car market in the U.S., he made a 3-year commitment to keep the plant open. Thanks to our work we won one of the great UAW labor/Black/Latin@/women’s victories of the entire period as GM kept the plant open until 1992—the exact ten years we had demanded to “keep GM Van Nuys Open.” More than 4,000 workers, 50% Latin@, 15 Black, 15% women, kept their jobs for a full decade.” Source “Speaking to a crowd of about 750 GM employees and their supporters, civil rights leader Jesse Jackson praised the auto workers as “freedom fighters,” and a Chamber of Commerce official said the possible plant closing could have a devastating economic impact on the entire San Fernando Valley.”
15. 1981 First Major News Article about HIV/ AIDS Article: https://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/03/us/rare-cancer-seen-in-41-homosexuals.html Entitled “Rare Cancer Seen in 41 Homosexuals,” the article was penned by Lawrence K. Altman and appeared in the New York Times. At the time, gay men were dying of an unusual disease. They presented with purple spots on the skin, and their lymph nodes eventually became swollen before they died. It seemed to be cancer—but the symptoms matched a type usually only seen in very old people. The people who were dying at the time, however, were young and otherwise healthy. Doctors did not understand what was happening or whether the cancer was contagious.
18. 1982 Koreatown sin unveiled The 1965 Immigration Act ended various exclusionary immigration policies. It also set up a system of preference that favored skilled workers and the families of American citizens. This landmark piece of legislation facilitated massive new waves of Asian migration. New communities arose, such as Los Angeles’ Koreatown, and the Sikh community in Yuba City, whose temple is pictured here. As Asian migrants with more capital arrived, “suburban Chinatowns” such as Monterey Park grew.
19. 1982 Anti- nuclear Protests Upwards of one million people demonstrated in New York City's Central Park June 12, 1982 against nuclear weapons and for an end to the cold war arms race. It was the largest anti-nuclear protest in American history. On the morning of June 12, 1982, as the sun shined down on the green grass in Central Park, people began to gather carrying signs for nuclear disarmament. Throughout the morning, buses arrived from around the country. By the afternoon, nearly every blade of grass was covered. Citizens filled second, third, fifth, sixth, seventh, and Madison avenues. By mid-afternoon, the police estimated that over 750,000 people were in Central Park demanding an end to nuclear weapons. By the end of the day, that number had swelled to 1 million
20. 1982 Anti-nuclear protests