Atlanta City Hall was full of energy the morning of Monday, June 5, with hundreds of protestors, sign-wielders, flute players (yes, there were two ladies playing the flute) and people lining up to speak during the public comment section of that day’s city council meeting. A “Stop Cop City” rally took place that morning and brought people to the city’s seat of power to voice a myriad of concerns, some of which were even the construction of a police and fire training facility in DeKalb County, the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center, otherwise known as “Cop City.”
Topics of discussion during a “Stop Cop City” protest that took place just after 11 a.m. ranged from affordable housing, education funding and the arts to mental health training, climate justice and the conditions at the Dekalb County jail. What began as a concern over the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center, on Monday, turned into a pulpit for every issue that could fit into the atrium at City Hall.
Community Movement Builders organizer Keyanna Jones was one of the day’s speakers. “We had to have people come out because we need to show people that we are not afraid. That no matter what the state of repression is, no matter how much they push back at us we are going to stand,” Jones said.
Asked whether all of the different movements and interests on display – “Stop Cop City”, “Defend the forest”, “Black Lives Matter,” for example- had a place at the rally that morning Jones, an Atlanta native, said they did.
“I think this is the message. The message is that we are all together,” she said. “So it doesn’t matter if your main vote is to change things, Black Lives matter, or I want to save the trees. Cop City affects all of us.”
The people have spoken and spoken and spoken
Public comment went on for just over 14 hours between Monday afternoon and Tuesday morning before the city council cast an 11-4 vote in favor of the training facility early Tuesday morning.
City Council President Doug Shipman said of the more than 300 citizens that gave their piece Monday/Tuesday, “Atlanta is unique in Georgia in the length of public comment that our rules allow and last night we extended to allow everyone to speak.”
“This is bigger than just one training facility,” said one of the more than 150 people that spoke during the public comment portion of the meeting just after 9 p.m. The public comments would continue until 11 p.m. as members of various City of Atlanta districts took the microphone and expressed their feelings on what is proposed as a $67 million public safety training center for the city’s police men and women and firemen and women. There is a planned $31 million for the facility and $36 million for a multi-year lease on the land.
A lot of the arguments being made by protestors prior to the start of the 1pm city council meeting was about how much better the City of Atlanta could be spending the funds.
“What do we want to have safe housing or Cop City?,” Housing Justice League Executive Director Allison Johnson asked the crowd inside City Hall. She immediately rhetorically answered, “Safe housing and what we want today is to stop this crap.”
Protestors wore t-shirts that read “Vote”, “APF is a scam”, “Defend the Forest” and “Stop Cop City.” They chanted everything from “You can’t stop a revolution”, “This is what democracy looks like” and the ever popular “I believe that we will win.” Hand-drawn signs with Rayshard Brooks’ photo and “Say their names” were waved around.
There were many messages brought to the floor Monday morning, but by 5:30 a.m. the next day the message was clear: City Council 11-4 in favor of going forward with funding the construction of the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center.
“This is the people’s house today,” shouted Kamau Franklin, founder of Community Movement Builders, hours before the city council meeting began. “They call this the Black Mecca, but this is the Black sweatshop.”