Photo: Diane Krauthamer
BOSTON – Equipped with megaphones, banners, and golf clubs, nearly 100 community members “teed off” at Deutsche Bank’s gala dinner at the Four Seasons Hotel on Boylston Street. In the early evening of September 2, Boston-area labor and housing activists—representing such groups as City Life/Vida Urbana, Jobs with Justice, Mass Alliance of HUD Tenants, Community Labor United, Mass Alliance Against Predatory Lending and the SEIU—demonstrated at the dinner, which kicked off the bank’s annual PGA golf championship. According to organizers, Deutsche Bank forecloses on more homes in Massachusetts than any other financial institution in the state.
“Deutsche Bank is the largest predatory lender in the state,” said Grace Ross of the Mass Alliance Against Predatory Lending. “Meanwhile, Massachusetts is losing $59 billion every two years because of the foreclosure crisis. This crisis wasn’t made by you and it wasn’t made by me. It was made by these large banks who wanted to make a quick buck.”
At the hotel, Ross joined local labor and community leaders to present a notice of eviction for Deutsche Bank to vacate the state of Massachusetts. Security guards blocked the demonstrators from entering, yet the noise and momentum of the demonstration remained strong.
“Deutsche Bank has refused to work with us since day one,” commented Melonie
Griffiths-Evans, of the Bank Tenants Association (BTA). The BTA has directly asked Deutsche to renegotiate mortgages and stop thousands of evictions each year, yet the bank continues to refuse. “Their only interest is to make money off our backs,” she said.
“Financial institutions lie to people who suffer the most,” added Jean Wassell, a retired social worker and volunteer with City Life/Vida Urbana. “When the (financial institutions) give out mortgages, they leave out people who can’t afford it. Now the shelters are jammed, and this is creating a rise in homelessness.” In providing legal services for recently-evicted tenants, she has noticed that City Life/Vida Urbana is “certainly assisting a lot of people who are losing their jobs.”
Wassell said both housing and labor rights have suffered drastically thanks to the economic crisis, but now is a more important time than ever to stay motivated and keep up the fight for economic justice.
“Everyday more and more people are being laid off and more and more people are being evicted from their homes. We cannot back down to these financial institutions, and we certainly will not let them control our lives,” Wassell said.
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