Strickland meets with protesters at City Hall; labor unions demand better conditions

After spending the night sleeping in Downtown Memphis, protesters outside City Hall said early Wednesday that they planned to stay until Mayor Jim Strickland came down to speak with them. 

Various groups of protesters have demonstrated outside City Hall between Tuesday and Wednesday. The groups share similar, but not the same, demands of the city. A common thread is found in directing less of the city's funding toward the police department in exchange for augmenting funding of community programs. 

Strickland met with those Wednesday, just before noon.

Demonstrations in Civic Center Plaza began Tuesday morning with a rally for George Floyd, organized by the Memphis Interfaith Coalition for Hope and Change (MICAH). The time of the rally, 8:46 a.m., memorialized the 8 minutes and 46 seconds Floyd spent restrained with a police officer’s knee on his neck before his death in Minneapolis last month.

By Wednesday morning, 24 hours later, around a dozen protesters representing various groups were fueling up with Blue's City Donuts and Dunkin' Donuts coffee, determined to stay until Strickland met them outside.

"This is my apartment until Strickland comes out," said Shannon Franklin, gesturing to the tent she set up in the plaza.

Franklin is an organizer with the Black Lives Matter chapter in Memphis. She outfitted the tent with two blankets to sleep in overnight. 

Regina Clarke, with the Memphis office of the Poor People's Campaign, said staying on the plaza is meant to be a reminder that the area belongs to the people of the city.

"Strickland needs to understand that your job is for the people," she said. "Stop hiding behind the office." 

Strickland went down to meet with those on Civic Center Plaza on Wednesday after reading in The Commercial Appeal that they wanted to meet. 

“I think that we have a lot more in common than we disagree with," Strickland said. "The points of disagreement did come out in the conversation." 

He sent The Commercial Appeal a picture of a leaflet from the Democratic Socialists of America Mid-South Chapter. The leaflet calls for adoption of four measures the Memphis City Council passed Tuesday, defunding the police department and not relaxing the residency requirement for MPD personnel. It also asks Memphis adopt the 8 Can’t Wait platform aimed at reducing police brutality. 

"I didn’t know (how much we agreed on) until I got back to the office and looked at the picture," Strickland said. "Most of this is what I ran on.” 

Strickland is opposed to reducing the police department’s budget and has expressed support for the November referendum on whether MPD personnel could live 50 miles outside city limits. Over the past few weeks, in response to calls for more investment in schools, libraries and other local social services, Strickland has touted the funding his administration has put into pre-K, affordable housing and reducing recidivism. 

Each of the programs he mentioned are small pieces of the Memphis city budget. That budget, like municipal budgets nationwide, spends the majority of its funds on public safety: police and fire.  

He and MPD Director Mike Rallings have also pointed to MPD police and Tennessee law and said MPD already complies with much of the 8 Can’t Wait agenda. 

He said it was unclear if the group would leave after speaking with him. City legal staff is analyzing whether the protesters are allowed to remain on Civic Center Plaza, but Strickland said he does not mind their presence.

Jan Lentz, with the Memphis-MidSouth Democratic Socialists of America, was working the breakfast table earlier Wednesday morning after staying up overnight. She was not at the plaza when Strickland spoke to the group, but told The Commercial Appeal she watched a video of the meeting. Based on Strickland's demeanor in the video, Lentz said, she doesn't think he is ready "to take our demands seriously." 

MICAH, the group the initially began the rally Tuesday, said they were not organizers of the group that remained at the plaza Wednesday. But, the group supports people who work toward justice and equity in Memphis, said Sandra Summers, a member of MICAH's executive team.

"We call on everyday citizens to hold our city officials accountable," she said. 

During Tuesday's rally, MICAH leaders taped a document aimed at enacting systemic change to the chainlink gate outside Memphis City Hall. 

MICAH rally:Faith leaders, Memphis City Council members push for change as rallies, protests approach fourth week

Local unions call for more protection, support of workers during COVID-19

Also on Wednesday, AFL-CIO and other unions arranged a caravan to call for increased worker safety during COVID-19. About two dozen cars assembled in Midtown, honking their horns as they passed businesses that employ workers without providing what the union deems as adequate workplace protections from COVID-19.

The group planned to end the caravan outside local and federal government offices downtown. They want governments to intervene by passing the HEROES Act on a federal level. Locally, they are calling for more regulation of employers who put workers and public health at risk. 

The group is advocating for enhanced worker rights for all workers and for Black workers, in particular.

"(Black workers) are in the warehouses, and the low-wage paying jobs, with less security and no health insurance," said Kermit Moore, president of the Memphis A. Philip Randolph Institute. "And many of these corporations aren't practicing safe worker conditions. It's about the Black lives movement." 

Moore continued: "If we don't change now, when will we change? My parents were marching for rights 60 years ago, and we're still fighting for the same rights."

The group's list of demands include: 

• Administrative leave for all public workers sick or exposed to COVID-19
• Hazard pay for all essential workers
• Assurance that all public workers have living wages and health insurance; cover all COVID-19 related healthcare costs.  
• Requiring all employers within the county to provide PPE, properly sanitize, protect workers from COVID-19 and follow federal law; providing a worker hotline to report violations
• Expanding community health services, with good union jobs
• Fully funding education, libraries and community centers
• No cuts, no layoffs, no privatization

Commercial Appeal reporter Samuel Hardiman contributed. 

Laura Testino covers education and children's issues for the Commercial Appeal. Reach her at laura.testino@commercialappeal.com or 901-512-3763. Find her on Twitter: @LDTestino