Occupy Buffalo’s stand against big banking and their injustices

Written by CEJ intern Garrett from Canisius College

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

“Through rain, through snow, Occupy Buffalo,” was the chant heard on the march down Main Street today by upwards of 50 protestors marching to Bank of America through the rain and mud. Many of these activists have been occupying Niagara Square for the past two weeks, showing that they are tired of the way big banking is treating the 99%. The square is filled with tents and signs, showing these men and women don’t plan on leaving anytime soon. This group is using their democratic right to protest peacefully, and the movement is spreading with each protest they have.

As a volunteer for CEJ, I joined the Occupy Buffalo group for the first time today but was immediately shown camaraderie and treated as one of the group. I was offered a poncho, a sign and even some food before the march. We marched from Niagara Square to Bank of America and even rounded up a few more people for the group on our march. Once we arrived at the front of the Bank of America, a milk crate was put down and grievances were aired. Most of these grievances had to do with the bailout of large failing banks, which Bank of America received $45 billion in TARP bailouts.

One point that was aired on the “soap box” that hit home for me is that the regular employee of Bank of America makes $20,000 a year. This was called barely a living wage, and we at the CEJ are striving for living wages for all. The leaders of Bank of America gave themselves raises with bailout money, totaling in $4.4 billion, couldn’t they have given raises to the backbone of their corporation?

Not only is the bank not paying their workers enough, they are planning on cutting many of their employees. Companies like these should not be receiving tax breaks and bail outs. Bank of America has avoided to pay taxes with $953 million in tax rebates in 2010. “Too big to fail” doesn’t matter when workers aren’t being given a living wage or even a promise that they will have a job next year. The amount they are paying their workers for a normal work week is not full or fair employment and we should all be striving to achieve this in all work sectors.

Bank of America had four guards on hand for today’s rally that stood staring at the group from within the bank doors. The group made sure to follow any and all laws while participating in this protest and let it be known that this is a peaceful protest. It’s a protest of trying to get a message across to those who don’t see it or prefer to ignore it. These guards did not interfere with the protest, only kept one of the members of the protest from withdrawing his own money from the bank.

The one protestor entered the bank doors with his Bank of America card in hand but was immediately stopped by one of the guards. He let it be known that he is a customer and that he only wanted to withdraw some of his funds. The guard refused to let him past the main door, even though the man is a customer looking to withdraw some of his own money from his own account. That is not right and it takes groups like Occupy Buffalo to expose this sort of injustice alive in our world today.

The next step to encouraging a thriving Main Street is for people to withdraw all their funds from large banks on November 5^th at 10 AM. Moving money from big banks who have proven their allegiance to profit over people, to a credit union in Buffalo, will mean literally moving money from Wall Street, to the Main Street of Buffalo. These credit unions and other local banks invest in our community and they are worth our support.

Occupy Buffalo has many positive goals, but they need more support. The group is supposed to represent the 99% and until they gain a bigger population here in Buffalo, I doubt if much will be done. Things like the National Bank Transfer Day will help to hammer the point home, and it’s events like these that the group needs to stay organized. They are for the empowerment of the individual and they’re striving for economic justice by bringing their problems to those who are preventing it.