Palestine Solidarity Information, Analysis, Local Actions and Events for the week of October 20th
It has been a little more than 1 year since the Israeli government began their most recent assault on Gaza and the West Bank. The retaliation for the October 7 Hamas attack in Israel, has escalated to what the international community has called genocide, therefore, GRIID will be providing weekly links to information and analysis that we think can better inform us of what is happening, along with the role that the US government is playing. We will also provide information on local events and actions that people can get involved in. All of this information is to provide people with the capacity of what Noam Chomsky refers to as, intellectual self-defense.
Information
Israel is Turning Northern Gaza Into a Killing Cage
Israel is committing the crime of extermination — UN inquiry
The Israeli Spies Writing America’s News
Rashid Khalidi: “Israel Is Acting With Full US Approval”
Israel’s Blockade Bars WFP From Distributing Food “in Any Form” in North Gaza
No Matter the Cost – Things the Israeli Genocide in Gaza Taught Us about Palestine, and the World
200+ Jewish-Led Protesters Arrested at NY Stock Exchange Say ‘Stop Arming Israel’
US Support Has Assured Israel That It Can Kill With Impunity
Anti-Zionist Workers Are Being Purged From Jewish Institutions Across the US
Yahya Sinwar killed in combat with Israeli forces in Gaza
Analysis & History
A Study Reveals CNN and MSNBC’s Glaring Gaza Double Standard
Gaza First Amendment Alert 10/16/2024
Image used in this post is from Jewish Voices for Peace protest at New York Stock Exchange.
Grand Rapids Board unanimously approves a $565 million subsidy for a development project proposed by two billionaire families
On Wednesday, the Grand Rapids Brownfield Redevelopment Authority unanimously approved the subsidy, known as a Transformational Brownfield Plan, for the DeVos/Van Andel development project in downtown Grand Rapids.
MLive reported that the Grand Rapids Brownfield Redevelopment Authority agreed to provide a $565 million subsidy for the project.
One thing that I immediately noticed about the subsidy amount, was that it was $21 million larger than the original amount cited by MLive back in late September, which was $544 million.
The announcement of the unanimous approval by the Grand Rapids Brownfield Redevelopment Authority to approve a $565 million subsidy to the two billionaire families wanting to build a massive development project in downtown Grand Rapids is not surprising at all. The MLive coverage of the announcement is also consistent with their previous coverage on this matter, which has been to simply provide a platform for the developing company to say whatever they want, without question.
The primary source in the MLive story was Joe Agostinelli, the founder of Michigan Growth Advisors, a firm that’s working with the company that is jointly owned by DeVos and Van Andel. The MLive article also cites Sarah Rainero, who is the Economic Development Director for the City of Grand Rapids. Rainero talked about how the $565 million subsidy is primarily from the state. While that may be true, it is still public money, which means that the billionaire families of DeVos and Van Andel will receive more than two-thirds of the cost of this development project from public funding.
The only other source cited in the MLive article was Grand Rapids Mayor Bliss, who said that she was “really glad” that this project was moving forward, plus she referred to it as “transformational.” Seems like we know where Bliss stands on this matter when it comes before the City Commission for a vote. Unfortunately, the MLive article said nothing about when that vote might be. It seems that MLive also doesn’t really care what the public thinks about another massive development project by two billionaire families, using a $565 million subsidy.
Major MLive Omission
Besides leaving out public voices on the massive subsidy for the billionaires development project, the MLive article doesn’t cite anyone from the government body – the Grand Rapids Brownfield Redevelopment Authority – in this story. Shouldn’t the public know who these people are and what interests they represent? Well, why don’t I just tell you.
You can find the list of the 11 members board that makes up the Grand Rapids Brownfield Redevelopment Authority by going to this link. Besides including their name, I am including who these people work for, which should tell you something about why they unanimously approved the project and the $565 million subsidy.
- Jeff Edwards, Chair – Principal, Reveille Development Company, used to work for Rockford Construction
- Lynn Rabaut, Vice-Chair – former GR City Commissioner, retired as the Executive Director at GR Griffins Youth Foundation
- Kristine Bersche, Secretary – Environmental Business Advisor with Bridge House Advisors.
- Troy Butler, Treasurer – Managing Parter at Squeegee Squad Grand Rapids
- Guillermo Cisneros – President & CEO – West Michigan Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, a board member of Grand Action 2.0 and the Economic Club of Grand Rapids
- Kaylee Dillard – Project Manager at Wolverine Building Group
- Brooke Oosterman Executive Director of Housing Next, which was created by the Grand Rapids Chamber of Commerce
- Martin Uchendu – Realtor at Five Star Real Estate
- John Van Fossen – Vice President Government Affairs at Meijer
- Lynee Wells – Founder + CEO Aligned Planning
- Milinda Ysasi, Commissioner – CEO at Grow, and as a GR City Commissioner has enthusiastically supported downtown development projects, all of which have used massive public subsidies.
As you can see, the people who make up the board for the Grand Rapids Brownfield Redevelopment Authority represent interests that benefit developers and those in the professional and Capitalist class. Unfortunately, these people do not represent the interests of most BIPOC communities, working class people, and people who are living paycheck to paycheck, which are the majority of people living in this city.
New resource for voting records in Kent County, Grand Rapids and the GRPS Board of Education
When it comes to election cycles there are things that thinking people should always consider. First, it is important to think about campaign finances, who is funding what candidate(s) and how much. Campaign finances are important for numerous reasons, but largely they tell us something about who candidates will give more of the attention to, along with whom their allegiances will be given to.
Another important piece of election related information is knowing the voting record of someone who is an incumbent in any given electoral race or for candidates that are running for a different office other than the one(s) they held previously. Voting record help to cut through all the rhetoric of candidates during an election season, since voting records will more honestly tell us something about where candidates really stand on issues.
At the federal level there is the website votesmart.org. For voting records at the state level in Michigan, there is michiganvotes.org. Ironically, michiganvotes.org is a project of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, which is a far right think tank, but this resource is legitimate.
Historically, if you are looking to find the voting records of local elected officials, those in Kent County, the City of Grand Rapids or the Grand Rapids School Board, then you would have to look that information up based on meeting minutes. However, there is a new project that began this year, the Local Democracy, Transparency and Accountability Project, which not only allows you to view the voting records of elected officials in the Kent County Commission, the Grand Rapids City Commission and the Grand Rapids Public School Board of Education, this site provides you with information on campaign financing data for current candidates and ballot initiatives.
Now, the Local Democracy, Transparency and Accountability Project only began this year, so the information so far will be just for 2024, but this project will continue for years to come. It is somewhat surprising that such a project didn’t exist before, but now people have an opportunity to look at both the voting records of elected officials and political incumbents, along with campaign finance data for all local races and for ballot initiatives.
GRIID encourages you to utilize the resources included in this post, to be a more informed voter, to hold local elected officials accountable and to demand more all year round and not just during elections. We all need to practice participatory democracy and expand it, especially since the word democracy means – the people rule or the people govern.
MLive articles on the DeVos family continues the tradition of acting as stenographers to power
On October 14, MLive posted two articles about the DeVos family, primarily around their funding of political candidates and other political funding in general over the last decade.
As someone who has devoted a great deal of energy over the past several decades to monitoring the DeVos family, these two MLive articles only cover the tip of the iceberg when it comes to how the DeVos family uses their money to influence politics, particularly in Michigan.
Let’s start with the primary article, headlined, Billionaire DeVos family has poured nearly $12 million into 2024 election.
This article begins with some superficial commentary about the total amount the DeVos family has contributed over the years, but then the story shifts a bit to say:
The prominent Michigan family hasn’t kept the wealth to itself. Seven DeVos family foundations have given nearly $839 million to hundreds of nonprofits over the past decade. They’ve helped finance major developments in downtown Grand Rapids.
This sounds like apologetics to me, where the MLive writer seeks to paint the DeVos family has doing “good” through their foundations and with the money they have pumped into the downtown development projects in Grand Rapids. This overly simplistic defense of the DeVos family not only exposes the bias of the MLive writer, it is completely false. The DeVos family foundations have contributed a lot of money to non-profits over the last decade, but the bulk of these contributions have gone to higher education (to influence campus policies/departments), far right think tanks like the American Enterprise Institute or to religious groups that seek to impose religion on the public arena. I have been monitoring their foundations over the past decade, on an annual basis, just go to this link.
On the matter of financing major developments in downtown Grand Rapids, the MLive writer omits the fact that in almost every instance, public funding of development projects has outweighed what the DeVos family has contributed. Just look at the most recent example, where the DeVos and Van Andel proposed development project, with the total cost is likely to be $738 million, these families want $544 million in public subsidies.
There are other major omissions in the main MLive article, such as the section on the Michigan Freedom Network. The Michigan Freedom Network is the political action committee of the Michigan Freedom Fund, which was created by the DeVos family, something that was conveniently left out of the article. In fact, the person who ran the Michigan Freedom Fund a few years ago was Greg McNeilly, a longtime DeVos political operative, who now runs the Windquest Group, which is part of Dick and Betsy’s empire.
The article also mentions the Great Lakes Education Project, which the DeVos family has contributed to, but fails to acknowledge that the the Great Lakes Education Project was created by the DeVos family after Michigan defeated a school vouchers ballot initiative in 2000.
The remainder of the MLive article looks at campaign finances from the DeVos family around campaigns in Michigan for federal offices and State races. Unfortunately, the MLive article omits the amount of money that the DeVos family has contributed to Kent County and Grand Rapids City politics in recent years.
If we look at how much of their wealth they have spent just since the 2022 election, even that amount is pretty staggering. In the 2022 election GRIID documented that the DeVos family contributed $12,304,750.00 to candidates running for office and for ballot initiatives.
When it comes to Kent County election campaign contributions in 2022, the DeVos family spent $60,900.00, which was also the largest amount from any one group in Kent County. In addition, for the Grand Rapids City Commission races, the DeVos family contributed $9450.00 to one candidate in the 1st Ward and $9450.00 to one candidate in the 3rd Ward.
So far in the 2024 election, the DeVos family has contributed $264,000 for just 4 Kent County candidates, which include the County Clerk, County Treasurer, County Prosecutor and the Kent County Sheriff, all of which are running as Republicans.
The second MLive article, which is headlined, Dick and Betsy DeVos fund controversial, pro-Trump sheriffs program, is a bit misleading, since the article covers more than the pro-Trump sheriff’s program.
The major omission in the first part of the second MLive article on the DeVos family, is their failure to look at the larger context of the recent public scrutiny of policing in this country. The Black Lives Matter movement made policing an issue, primarily since the police shot and killed Michael Brown over a decade ago. Ever since then, there has been a push the billionaire class to fund policing, since the cops are a necessary component to protect the interests of the billionaires like the DeVos family.
There is also a section about the legacy of funding conservative causes. MLive relies on former Michigan Governor John Engler to defend the DeVos family, so much so that they don’t challenge his assertions. The article sates: But the other foundations funded by the second generation of the DeVos family don’t evince the same level of enthusiasm for building conservative political institutions.
This is simply not true and I would challenge anyone to actually look at all of the articles I have written about how the DeVos family foundations have contributed to conservative causes over the past decade, which you can read in the section on DeVos foundations in my ever-growing document, the DeVos Family Reader.
Now, I’m sure that the MLive writer thinks that they are shinning the light on the most powerful family in West Michigan. The reality is, these two article continue to frame the DeVos family in a positive light, with only mild partisan influences, but fails to discuss the ideology that has driven the DeVos family to impose their worldview on the rest of us and the harm it has done over the decades.
WZZM 13 does more harm than good with their reporting on rental costs in Grand Rapids
A week ago, WZZM 13 aired a story which began by presenting the perspectives of two renters, both of which talked about the ridiculously high rental costs in Grand Rapids.
The channel 13 story then lets viewers know that Grand Rapids is the 11th toughest city to find an apartment in, according to RentCafe. GRIID reported on this same RentCafe data, especially how it was presented on MLive last week. The MLive reporter didn’t even both to speak with tenants who are deeply impacted by the unjustly high rental fees in Grand Rapids.
However, despite the fact that WZZM 13 did provide commentary from tenants, the rest of their story simply provided a platform for people who represent business interests and have no idea how tenants are currently being exploited. Right after hearing from tenants, the channel 13 story cuts immediately to Josh Lunger, a government affairs person with the Grand Rapids Chamber of Commerce. Lunger states:
“Whether that’s land-use decisions, and talking about especially, how do we fill along corridors, which is a big priority for Housing Next, or if it’s responsibly and adequately over deploying the tools like housing tax increment financing and other things that the state has enabled or the locals have invested in or it’s just zoning and code obstacles.”
What the GR Chamber staffer essentially did was to dismiss the comments of the renters cited in the channel 13 story, blaming government regulation for the housing crisis instead of the outrageous cost of rent.
WZZM 13 did a follow up story on Grand Rapids being the 11th toughest city to find an apartment in, but instead of talking to more renters or groups like the Grand Rapids Area Tenant Union, they provide a platform for a Grand Rapids Chamber of Commerce created group.
The group Housing Next is the only source cited in the October 13th WZZM 13 story. Housing Next, which was created by the Grand Rapids Chamber of Commerce, represents business interests, not those of working class individuals and families that can’t afford the cost of rent in this market, primarily because they don’t make a living wage.
Brooke Oosterman, executive director of Housing Next, is the only person cited in this channel 13 story, where she continues to blame government regulation instead of addressing the unaffordable cost of rent that thousands of West Michiganders face. Here is one of the innocuous comments from Oosterman:
“It’s working with our local communities, helping them to understand the vision, helping them to rewrite their ordinances in favor of more residential development…And so there are some big challenges ahead of us, right? It’s going to take a very, very strategic, collaborative, intentional approach to get there, but the benefit is, we’re all going to be better for it.”
In the end, WZZM 13 does more harm than good, since they don’t center the lived experience of tenants in this city, they provide a platform for a GR Chamber of Commerce created entity that is committed to finding housing solutions with a market-based approach. Market-based solutions to the current housing crisis are a false solution, but that doesn’t matter, since the local news media has made Housing Next the darling of all things housing.
GR groups joins The Rent is Too Damn High letter to Gov. Whitmer with list of demands and announced mass demonstration in Lansing this November
For over a year now, the Lansing-based group, The Rent is Too Damn High, has been making demands of the State of Michigan and working with Tenant Unions in the fight for housing justice.
In September of 2023, some 500 tenants and other housing activists showed up in Lansing with very clear demands, which GRIID wrote about.
Last week, The Rent is Too Damn High sent a letter to Gov. Whitmer – along with other elected officials – with a list of demands and an announcement that they are calling for a mass demonstration in Lansing to get the Lame Duck period of the State Legislature to pass numerous bills that would make the lives of tenants less stressful.
Here is the entire text of the letter:
To:
Gretchen Whitmer, Governor
Winnie Brinks, Senate Majority Leader
Joe Tate, House Speaker
Jeff Irwin, Senate Housing & Human Services Chair
Jason Hoskins, House Economic Development & Small Business Chair Kristian Grant, House Economic Development & Small Business Vice Chair
We are tenants’ unions, housing justice groups, and housing service providers, writing to urge you to pass and sign renters’ rights legislation before the 2023-2024 legislative session concludes. Our members and constituents have been devastated by Michigan’s housing crisis, which has grown more dire under the current administration.
We have held dozens of meetings with state Representatives and Senators, who assured us of their intent to support renters, tenants and the unhoused. And when the Governor acknowledged that “the rent is too damn high!” in her State of the State Address this year, we listened with hope.
Instead of having renters’ backs, your trifecta government leadership has fast-tracked proposals that prioritize real estate developer’s interests, while leaving renters’ rights to languish in committee. Respectfully, the Governor’s exclusive focus on “build baby build” is not a serious approach to ensure that we all have stable and comfortable housing in the years to come. Supply-side interventions alone will take the better part of a decade to impact housing prices. Renters need protection and relief now!
There is still an opportunity to do right. Because of our members’ advocacy, your colleagues have introduced a historic number of renters’ rights bills this session. Now they need to be passed and signed into law. Among the dozens of worthy bills introduced, we are united in support of these nine:
We want to be clear: The reason we are so determined is because of the increasing difficulty of daily life for renters across the state. Our members are doing their best to keep their families safe and sheltered as they are nickeled, dimed, and evicted by (increasingly, out-of-state private equity based) corporate landlords. Now we need you to do your best for them.
On November 13, we will mobilize our members to insist you do the right thing in the Lame Duck session. Renters are fed up with being on the downside of a winners and losers economy. It’s time to give tenants a fighting chance at good housing, by protecting our basic rights. We need these bills to pass this term.
With conviction, and full of fight for our families and neighbors,
- MI Rent Is Too Damn High
Detroit Disability Power
We The People MI Action Fund - Ann Arbor Tenants Union
McKinley Tenants Association
Detroit Action
Keeweenaw Tenants Union
MH Action Michigan Team - Lansing Rent Is Too Damn High
Linc Up Nonprofit Housing Corporation - Grand Rapids Area Tenant Union
Community Owns Safety Coalition - We The Tenants Kalamazoo
- Traverse City Housing Justice Team
- Nation Outside
Detroit Tenants Association
Grand Rapids churches collaborate with the GRPD during the national Faith and Blue weekend
The enforcers of state violence, the cops, have been scrambling for years, especially after the creation of the Movement for Black Lives to present themselves as a social benefit.
When the massive uprising against policing happened in 2020, with calls to defund the police, even more groups emerged on the national and local scene to defend the institution of policing.
This past week there were groups all across the US and in Grand Rapids celebrating Faith and Blue week, a bizarre collaboration between faith communities and police departments.
WXMI 17 first reported on this collaboration on Friday, with a story headlined, Faith-based discussion pushes for change, collaboration. The channel 17 story, included links to two specific events that were happening in the community.
One event was a Pray and Play basketball game, where the GRPD played youth members of the GR Alternative Correctional Experience. The second event, held on Saturday, was a Crime Awareness and Law Enforcement Community Resource Fair.
The world is truly a strange and contradictory place, where you have pastors collaborating with cops with the intent of promoting community safety. The clear contradiction is in the clergy’s failure to understand the history of policing (See Kristian Williams’ book – Our Enemies in Blue: Police and Power in America), along with the fact that cops have been disproportionately killing Black people at a very high rate. (See https://mappingpoliceviolence.org/)
At another level, this all makes complete sense, especially in Grand Rapids, where the GRPD has had a program for several years called Clergy on Patrol. Clergy on Patrol is where local clergy do ride alongs with the GRPD and participate in various training exercises, in an attempt to humanize cops.
The Faith and Blue campaign was begun in 2020 as a direct response to the massive uprisings in the US after George Floyd was killed by a cop, coupled with the demands to defund the police. The Faith and Blue campaign was created by the group Movement Forward, which was founded by Reverend Markel Hutchins.
The Faith and Blue mission, “was launched to facilitate safer, stronger, more just and unified communities by directly enabling local partnerships among law enforcement professionals, residents, businesses and community groups through the connections of local faith-based organizations.” The partners involved in the Faith and Blue campaign are a few Christian groups, but mostly state, regional and national law enforcement agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security.
We should see the Faith and Blue campaign simply as a desperate attempt by cops to win over public support and as an opportunity for some clergy to cash in on the funding that is being offered by such programs.
Palestine Solidarity Information, Analysis, Local Actions and Events for the week of October 13th
It has been a little more than 1 year since the Israeli government began their most recent assault on Gaza and the West Bank. The retaliation for the October 7 Hamas attack in Israel, has escalated to what the international community has called genocide, therefore, GRIID will be providing weekly links to information and analysis that we think can better inform us of what is happening, along with the role that the US government is playing. We will also provide information on local events and actions that people can get involved in. All of this information is to provide people with the capacity of what Noam Chomsky refers to as, intellectual self-defense.
Information
U.S. Foreign Policy Has Created a Genocidal Israel
As Israel Extends Its Genocide Into the West Bank, It Targets and Kills Children
US admits it doesn’t want diplomatic solution
ISRAEL’S BLOODY RECORD OF BOMBING SCHOOLS IN GAZA
How Israel killed hundreds of its own people on 7 October
Campuses Are Pulling Out All the Stops to Crush Palestine Solidarity This Fall
Blinken Approved Policy to Bomb Aid Trucks, Israeli Cabinet Members Suggest
How Israel Has Made Trauma a Weapon of War
ONE YEAR OF EMPTY RHETORIC FROM THE WHITE HOUSE ON ISRAEL’S WARS
Analysis & History
How October 7 Transformed Israeli Society
ISRAEL’S YEAR OF KILLING, MAIMING, STARVING, AND TERRORIZING THE PEOPLE OF GAZA
Image used in this post is from https://visualizingpalestine.org/
Shocking News: DeVos controlled Grand Rapids DDA approves DeVos/Van Andel development plan
Recently, the Grand Rapids Downtown Development Authority (DDA) approved a proposal from the DeVos/Van Andel. This should not come as a surprise to anyone who bothers to follow the DDA and who controls it. (See October 9 DDA Agenda)
The Grand Rapids DDA is made up of a 9 member board and two of those members – Greg McNeilly and Richard Winn are both DeVos employees. Richard Winn is the President of AHC Hospitality, which is a DeVos-owned company that manages 14 Hotels/Inns, most of which are in West Michigan. In addition to sitting on the DDA Board, Richard Winn is also on the boards of the Grand Rapids-Kent County Convention/Arena Authority, Experience GR, Downtown Grand Rapids Inc. and Grand Action 2.0. All of these entities work in collaboration to make sure that the DeVos and Van Andel families get what they want.
The other DeVos operative is Greg McNeilly. McNeilly was the campaign manager for the failed gubernatorial campaign of Dick DeVos in 2006. McNeilly is currently the Chief Operating Officer of the DeVos run Windquest Group, an entity that is owned by Dick & Betsy DeVos. McNeilly has also been the former President of the Michigan Freedom Fund, a far right political group that was also created by the DeVos family. McNeilly ran the campaign to oppose the Voters Not Politicians ballot initiative. In 2021, McNeilly defended the Enbridge Corporation and their plans to build a tunnel underneath the Great Lakes for the Line 5 oil pipeline.
Most of the recent of the DDA Board has some connection to the DeVos family as well, whether it is business dealings or receiving campaign funding, so there is no real opposing voices on the DDA when it comes to the most powerful families in this city.
Once you understand how the Grand Rapids Power Structure functions in this city, you will then be able to understand the decisions and the policies that are adopted by elected officials and groups like the Grand Rapids Downtown Development Authority.
Congresswoman Hillary Scholten is clearly an imperialist who supports the systematic murder of children in Gaza.
There were thousands of actions and gatherings that took place around the world on October 7, to draw attention to what is happening in Gaza.
In New York, Jewish activists and allies gathered Monday for a vigil on the first anniversary of October 7 to mourn Israelis and Palestinians who have been killed and to call for an end to the Israeli massacre in Gaza and beyond. Locally, the group Palestine Solidarity Grand Rapids organized an action at a weapons manufacturer in Zeeland, where parts are being made for bombs that the Israeli military is using against the Palestinians.
To commemorate October 7th, Rep. Hillary Scholten posted this message on her Facebook page:
One year after Hamas attacked Israel, we mourn the lives lost and the innocent people taken from their loved ones. Together, we must renew our commitment to bring the hostages home and work toward peace that truly lasts, so this will never happen again.
This in no way is surprising, since Rep. Scholten has been an unconditional supporter of Israel, traveled to Israel on an AIPAC sponsored trip in the summer of 2023, has been the recipient of plenty of Pro-Israel PAC money and has voted for every piece of legislation that has provided Israel with billions in US military aid and over 600 separate US weapons shipments to Israel, weapons that have been used to kill Palestinians. GRIID has been methodically documenting this since the summer of 2023.
The image that Rep. Scholten posted, along with the text above, was an image of a candle, with the words, Remembering October 7th. Of course, I altered the graphic she posted, as to reflect more of what Rep. Scholten has actually supported and which lives she finds worthy and those she finds unworthy.
The text she included in her October 7th post puts all the blame on Hamas, but says nothing about the internationally recognized genocide that Israel is committing. Scholten then says that she wants the hostages to be brought home, but ignores the thousands of Palestinian prisoners that Israel, which has always been part of the negotiation process.
Lastly, Rep. Scholten then demonstrates her bold faced hypocrisy by claiming she wants to work towards a lasting peace. How the hell can you unconditionally support over 600 US weapons shipments to Israel, weapons that are being used on Palestinians, then claim you want peace? Congresswoman Hillary Scholten is clearly an imperialist who supports the systematic murder of children in Gaza.
Graphic used here below is from https://visualizingpalestine.org/.
Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy 