Punch Up Collective

Reimagining Safety, Advancing Visions for a Decarceral City: Dispatches from Community Organizers
2023-03-30 18:00 - 20:00 (America/Toronto)
Amid global calls to defund the police following the murder of George Floyd by officers in Minneapolis, continued efforts to work towards diversion and decarceration from prisons, and on-going concerns stemming from the expansion of state and corporate surveillance, there continues to be a push to expand these and other forms of carcerality in the city of Ottawa located on unceded and unsurrendered Algonquin Territory. This is most evident in the year-over-year budget increases for the Ottawa Police Service (OPS), gentrification and the increased presence of police under the guise of “neighbourhood resource teams” in communities where poverty, homelessness and precarious housing are a common experience, the carceralization of public space through increases in surveillance and so-called security personnel from transit stations to sidewalks abutting sites of mass capitalist accumulation like the Rideau Centre, and the provincial government’s push to build more prison spaces in the region that will forcibly displace people pushed to the margins from the city to a proposed site of human caging in Kemtpville, as well as planned expansions to existing facilities in Brockville and Napanee. However, carcerality in the form of surveillance, coercion, control, displacement and even containment is not always fixed to particular spaces, but is also mobile, appearing in contexts often associated with care such schools, shelters, hospitals, harm reduction sites, treatment centres, and the like where being perceived to be out of place or engaging in behaviour deemed problematic can also lead to exclusion in the Carceral City in ways that diminish our collective well-being and safety.

This event, in the form of dispatches from community organizers, aims to make visible how carcerality is at work, as well as how safety is being reimagined and practiced outside of carceral frameworks in Ottawa. This intervention stems from a research project called “Resistance and Advocacy in the Carceral City” funded by an Insight Development Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada involving members of the University of Ottawa’s Carceral Studies Research Collective and community members involved in police, prison, penal and/or carceral abolitionist organizing in the city.

Film Screening: Cal Best: Sa Vie (Cal Best: His Life)
2023-03-29 16:30 - 18:30 | St. Paul Amphitheatre, 233 Main Street, Ottawa, Ontario, K1S1C4, Canada
The Workers’ History Museum and the Social Innovation Atelier invite you to the screening of the documentary Cal Best: His Life (Cal Best: Sa vie), about the journey of James Calbert Best, a prominent figure in Black history in the 20th century.
Following the film there will be a panel discussion with Blaise Ndala (writer in residence at Saint Paul University), Diana Mbonga (President of the Saint Paul Students Association), Claude Andrea Bonny (Journalist) and Arthur Carkner (Producer). Professors Leslie Toure Kapo and Christopher Gunter will moderate the discussion.
About the Film:
Cal Best, from New Glasgow, NS, co-founded PSAC and was a union leader who fought for the right to have better collective bargaining in the federal government. He went on to become a senior government official and Canada’s first Black High Commissions. A man who changed the world for the better!
Admission is free and refreshments will be available.
Note that the film is in French.

Ottawa ACORN Day of Action Against Developers!
2023-03-29 12:00 - 14:00 | Minto Park, 315 Elgin Street, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Minto Park, Elgin/Gilmour St.
Hosted by ACORN
The PC Party received $250,000 in donations from major developers in Ontario and consistently passes legislation that puts developer profits over tenants’ right to housing – JOIN ACORN TO FIGHT BACK!
The same developers that are funding the Doug Ford government are actively lobbying for and benefiting from Ford’s policies that destroy affordable housing (more details below). Join your local ACORN office on March 29th in taking action against local developers:
Ottawa – 12PM meeting at Minto Park (Elgin/Gilmour St) before marching to the Taggart office. Taggart has donated $30,000+ to the PC Party and was responsible for the demovictions at 142 Nepean St.
Brampton – 2PM meeting outside City Hall at 2 Wellington St W, and then marching to the Pulis Office. Pulis recently bought an apartment building with the goal of mass evicting tenants & demolishing their homes.
London – 1PM meeting outside 1154 Adelaide St. N. Members will be doing outreach on the impact of Ford’s Rent Control Loopholes and Bill 23 while highlighting local predatory developers.
Toronto – 2:45PM meeting at Cafe Landwer (165 University Ave). Members will be going to a developer’s office whose new development site has no proposed affordable housing.
Hamilton – 12PM at Gore Park. Members will be doing outreach on the devastating impacts of Bill 23.
MORE INFO ON FORD’S PRO-DEVELOPER PROFITS & ANTI-TENANT POLICIES:
Since becoming Premier in 2018 and being re-elected in 2022, Doug Ford has:

Removed rent control on all buildings built after Nov 15th, 2018
Removed development charges that developers pay to municipalities to fund essential municipal services like roads, sewers and public transit
Weakened an affordable housing policy called ‘inclusionary zoning’ to only 5% affordable housing in new developments near public transit for only 20 years
Changed the definition of affordable housing to 80% of average market rent which is not affordable!
Threatens to take away the power for cities to require developers to replace the affordable housing they demolish for condos & luxury rentals
AND MORE!

More info: https://www.facebook.com/events/242120718245487

Show up for Trans Kids!
2023-03-28 18:30 | OCDSB Head Office, 133 Greenbank Road, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
OCDSB head office, 133 Greenbank Road
Call for support from Community Solidarity Ottawa
In recent weeks, we have seen a number of anti-trans activists attend and school board meetings across Ontario in order to spread fear and hatred towards trans youth, including at the OCDSB.
Multiple anti-2SLGBTQIA+ figures have announced their plans to speak and disrupt at the upcoming OCDSB meetings on March 28 and April 4, where they will surely take the opportunity to grandstand and spread transphobic speech.
We’ve seen what happens when anti-trans hate is allowed to flourish. As such, we also plan to be there to show support for 2SLGBTQIA+ students and show that we won’t tolerate anti-trans hate in our community.
We are encouraging members of the community to come to these meetings in person to show support for trans and gender diverse students.
We are encouraging those who attend to show up early, to take up as much space in the meeting room as possible, and to wear either pink, or apparel that shows your support for 2SLGBTQIA+ students. If you don’t have any pink in your wardrobe, we will be providing pink scarves and bandannas that you can wear.
Additionally, if you would like to speak out against anti-trans hate and in support of policies that affirm and support trans and gender diverse students, you can request to speak at these meetings by filling out this form.
More info: https://www.communitysolidarityottawa.ca/events/show-up-for-trans-kids

Sample event
2023-03-28 10:00 - 12:00 | McNabb Community Centre, 180 Percy Street, Ottawa, Ontario, K1R 6E5, Canada
This is an exciting upcoming sample event!
