OWS People’s Library info AND press conference for 11/23/2011

PeaceSmiths donated a copy of the Constitution to the People's Library at Occupy Wall Street

KW writes: PeaceSmiths, Inc. supports the efforts of Occupy Wall Street. PeaceSmiths gathered some books from our archives, and sent them over as a gift to the OWS library. (Story: here)

It is upsetting that the NYPD destroyed many of the books from the Occupy Wall Street People’s Library in the 11/15 raid of the encampment. And, potentially destroyed our donations.

Today, Wednesday, November 23, 2011, there will be a press conference about the incident. Please go to occupywallst.org for more information: here.

Occupy Wall Street Librarians…
Nov. 23, 2011, 7:59 a.m. EST by OccupyWallSt

Over 4,000 Books, Documents, Were Trashed by NYPD & Dept. of Sanitation in Raid

OWS Library Staff Recovers Books and Supplies, Less Than One-Fifth is Usable

What: Press conference to address the destruction of the OWS People’s Library by [The NYC] Mayor during the 11/15 raid.

Photo Opportunity — All of the recovered, destroyed books will be at the press conference.

Where: 260 Madison Ave, 20th Floor, between 38th and 39th St

When: Wednesday, November 23, at 12:00 noon

Who: Norman Siegel will host and moderate. Speakers: Gideon Oliver of the National Lawyers Guild, Hawa Allan a Fellow at Columbia Law School, and Occupy Wall Street Librarians from the People’s Library. Law professors from Columbia, members of the American Library Association, various writers and others have been invited.

So far, the People’s Library has received 1,099 books back from the Dept. of Sanitation after last week’s raid (some of which were not library books to begin with), and out of these, about 800 are still usable. About 2,900 books are still unaccounted for, and less than one-fifth of the original collection is still usable. These numbers may change slightly when the People’s Library gets an exact count of the recent (and final) retrievals from Sanitation, but not considerably.

“The People’s Library was destroyed by NYPD acting on the authority of [The NYC] Mayor on the night of the raid. In addition to all our supplies, laptops, and tent, they threw roughly 4,000 books into garbage trucks and dumpsters that were adjacent to the park, as well as assorted rare documents that were associated with OWS,” says William Scott, an Occupy Wall Street Librarian.

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