Subject: Report on San Francisco Demonstration (Beaver).
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2000 124906 -0500
From: Roy Beavers
To: guru
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Subject: Report on San Francisco Demonstration
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2000 08:29:56 +0000
From: Christopher Beaver
Reply-To: idgfilms@earthlink.net
To: roy@emfguru.com
References: <39EC82C1.4FCFEC75@emfguru.com>
Dear Roy:
Here's my report on the demonstration in San Francisco adding our
solidarity with the demonstration in Salzburg last Friday and the
up-coming demonstration in South Bend, Indiana.
About forty to fifty people enthusiastically and vocally attended our
city-wide demonstration in San Francisco on October 15. The most
memorable image was a long line of people marching through an
antenna-threatened Russian Hill neighborhood waving signs and chanting,
"Cell No, We Won’t Glow."
Some of the earliest organizers in San Francisco jointed an ethnically
mixed crowd, which included six to eight children as well as a host of
new faces.
As planned, we gathered at an apartment building where three antennas
have been proposed and heard from resident, Enid Lim, a longtime
Chinatown activist, San Francisco Neighborhood Antenna-Free Union
founder, Doug Loranger, and four candidates for our Board of Supervisors
(the equivalent of a city council) plus yours truly.
The theme of the rally, echoed by every speaker, was clear and simple:
our concern over the over-burden of antennas in our neighborhoods
coupled with our desire, our demand, our insistence on having a say-so
over every aspect of their construction…or, as we would prefer, their non-construction.
Rounding out the speakers and truly launching us on our march with a
rousing call to unity and action was former vice-president of the
Communication Workers of America local, Giselle Quesada. Those union
people really know how to stir up a crowd.
After Giselle got us moving, we made a walking tour march through the
neighborhood, chanting as we went. Along the way I pointed out landmarks
in the threatened area (the Helen Wills Playground, for one, Wills being
an incredible tennis star from the 1920s, the playground itself being
at-risk as a result of funding cutbacks and gang activity) and
impressive arrays of existing antennas. The rooflines looked like pin cushions.
The demonstration concluded with another go-round of speakers at a
second proposed site, the Broadway Manor Motel on a major thoroughfare
that brings people from the Golden Gate Bridge to points west and south.
The site couldn’t have been more dangerously selected if that had been
the explicit intent: three unusually powerful Sprint antennas pointed
directly at a multi-story senior residential apartment, a Catholic
elementary school, and a dormitory for Academy of Art students to say
nothing of the surrounding residential apartment buildings check by jowl
with the motel.
Four nearby residents detailed their concerns: a superb scientific
researcher, and resident, Mark Longwood, spoke about radiation exposures
to residents that would reach 75 microwatts per centimeter squared (and
explained a little about what that meant): Debbie Ramos whose extended
family lives next door to the proposed site expressed concern for her
two children attending the elementary school; music instructor, Barbara
Wirth, described her personal experiences of relatives being affected by
antennas; and Colin Smiley, originally from Ireland, now resident
manager of the Academy of Art dormitory, thanked everyone for making the
residents’ concerns heard.
Three additional supervisor candidates pledged their commitment to
regulating the antennas. Especially moving was Agar Jaicks who joined
our original picket line against the Noe Valley antennas along with his
wife, Diana, from day one. At that time, Diana, a long-time labor and
human rights activist, was already suffering from the cancer that would
take her life. Agar told the hushed crowd that he believed his wife may
have been a victim of Sutro Tower.
The demonstration was well covered by the local press. Our local
television stations all broadcast reports. All were respectful. I
thought I even detected a subtle shift in the coverage from previous
stories about the struggle in my neighborhood.
Earlier, the reports would emphasize that opponents believed there was a
potential for danger. This time they were saying that the demonstrators
are opposing the danger from cellular antennas. A subtle, subtle change
but indicating an attitude more willing to accept the idea of a very
real hazard, not just a figment of our imaginations.
Print coverage included several Chinese language newspapers, a paragraph
mention in a newspaper across the Bay (in the shadow of a larger couple
of paragraphs on four "topless" women protesting the cutting of old
growth redwoods!!) and page three of the San Francisco Examiner, our
afternoon daily newspaper.
Under the Examiner’s headline, "Cell-antenna opponents: Not in our S.F.
backyard" were two large photographs of the march, one a five-year-old
girl holding a sign that read, "Don’t Fry Me," and the other a line of
people chanting and clapping.
Among the signs in the second photo, a big sign listing all the cities
around the world from which we received endorsements. These
endorsements, of course, were all generated through this very forum.
Many thanks to one and all. As Darth Vader might have said, it was most impressive.
The single paragraph in the Examiner, printed in over-size type read,
"Demonstrators who oppose what they call the improper siting of cellular
phone antennas marched through San Francisco streets on Sunday. The San
Francisco Neighborhood Antenna-Free Union walked from Leavenworth Street
to Van Ness and Broadway, where three new cell phone towers are proposed
to be built. The towers keep cell phone signals strong for customers,
but opponents say independent research shows a health risk comes with
living close to the antennas."
That phrase, "keep cell phone signals strong for customers," a rather
unusual turn of phrase, was repeated word for word in virtually every
news story we received. Does anyone know where it originated?
Large chunks of the press notably missing in action: the "alternative"
newspapers and our largest daily newspaper, the San Francisco Chronicle.
The latter maintained its perfect record of not carrying one news story
about opposition to cellular antennas.
Despite the the many personal accounts of harm from wireless
transmitters the demonstration ended on an up-note as those present
realized once again that they were not alone, that we form quite a
surprising and interesting-looking bunch, and that sooner or later we
will be joined by many others.
The Antenna-Free Union met last night, October 18th, to endorse
candidates in the up-coming city elections and make plans for our next
move. One likely prospect: aiming people toward the November 16 hearing
before our rubberstamp Planning Commission concerning the very antennas
we are protesting.
Mark Longwood, incidentally, pulled together an excellent introduction
booklet to the antenna issue in time for the demonstration. People who
are interested obtaining copies, to be priced as minimally as Mark can
manage, should contact Mark directly at mlongwood@hotmail.com.
Thank you to everyone who participated in our demonstration with your
endorsements, your words of encouragement, and your selfless efforts to
protect us from the Blue World.
Very best,
Christopher Beaver
Archive provided courtesy of WaveGuide, http://www.wave-guide.org
Reprinted with permission of Roy Beavers, http://www.emfguru.com