(Getty Images)

The City of New York has finally agreed to pay Occupy Wall Street for the property destroyed in the Zuccotti Park police raid on Nov. 15, 2011.

OWS initiated a suit on May 24, 2012, seeking compensation for the destruction of their People’s Library—a collection of over 5,000 donated books. About 3,600 of these were ruined during the early morning eviction of the protest camp.

The City agreed to settle yesterday, awarding $47,000 in damages to OWS and $186,349.58 in attorney fees to their lawyers.

“We’re very pleased with the resolution of this suit,” said Herbert Teitelbaum, a lawyer representing the plaintiffs. “The city acknowledged that what happened in the park on the night of the Zuccotti Park raid was inappropriate.”

According to Mr. Teitelbaum, the City rarely accepts liability when entering agreements such as this one. In collective settlement fees, the City will be coughing up over $400,000—including $75,000 in damage fees and $49,850 in attorney fees to Global Revolution T.V. An environmental nonprofit, Time’s Up, will receive $8,500 for 16 “energy” bicycles that were destroyed in the raid.

Third party defendant Brookfield Office Properties Inc., the owners of Zuccotti Park, will indemnify the City $15,666.67.

“We think that books are important and the destruction of books is a very disturbing thing, particularly when the government does it,” said Mr. Teitelbaum to The Observer.

What was most striking is how devoid of life Lower Manhattan is, particularly around the Financial District and Chinatown. Canal Street is eerily empty. But the farther along you get, the more you see. The sheer number of restaurants and bars in the Village operating by candlelight is astonishing. And even all the way downtown, you notice things you wouldn't expect, like tourists making the de rigueur pilgrimage to the Wall Street Bull, where a City Line tour bus happens to pull up. Also, the lights are back on at Zuccotti Park, while they are out across the street. Kind of seems like a waster of precious power, but it is also a refreshing reminder that life goes on.

By the time you get to Midtown, though, it's life as usual, with crowds everywhere—including in front of the Shake Shack in Times Square. And waiting, sometimes an hour or two, in front of Grand Central to cram onto one of those forlorn buses that have replaced the subway back to Brooklyn. So the Sandy tremors have not totally dissipated.

According to Facebook, 83 Occupiers plan to attend, but that doesn't account for potential protesters who refuse to be monetized by the social media behemoth.

Not the bagpipers arrested. (Brian Gautreau/Flickr)

The N.Y.P.D. was holding back regarding Occupy Wall Street protest actions on Saturday night until they put the smackdown on a band of European bagpipe players in nothing flat. The pipers showed around 11 p.m. and began playing for the assembly, but within 5 to 10 minutes they had been arrested, resulting in a sharp rise in tension in the crowd.

Bagpipers just started marching into the park bringing the party mood with them, NYPD arrested one of them, and things got real heated. #OWS

— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallStNYC) March 18, 2012

As police led the musicians away, the crowd chanted, "One more song!" The @NewYorkist Twitter feed reported the bagpipers were French musicians who had participated in a St. Patrick's Day parade earlier in the day.

Authorities began mobilizing in force to evict protesters and close Zuccotti Park after the bagpipers were taken away. Many protesters passively resisted by linking arms and sitting but mass arrests ensued.

Screengrab from TimCast on UStream

In case you thought the Occupy Movement had somehow vanished during the cold but relatively brief Winter, Occupy Wall Street protesters returned in force Saturday to familiar locales, apparently determined to make sure we knew they were still around and still D.T. P. (Down To Protest).

The Times reported early Saturday night that protesters "embarked upon a winding march" which led to a few arrests in and around the original home of the protest, Zuccotti Park.

The Times also noted Saturday's action was familiar:

In several respects, the march on Saturday was similar to the inaugural one. The crowd was on the small side but spirited and marched past the bronze sculpture of a bull at Bowling Green, which had served as a mustering spot for the first march. The marchers were accompanied by police officers on foot and on scooters who at one point blocked access to Wall Street, just as they did on Sept. 17...

Around 8 p.m. on Saturday a text went out stating "Liberty Square is being RE-OCCUPIED! 500+ people and growing! Come on down! Bring blankets & food!"

There was a brief celebrity appearance by Michael Moore, who endured some heckling from the assembly over his personal wealth. Code Pink, "a women-initiated grassroots peace and social justice movement" dedicated to ending United States-sponsored war and occupation was also in evidence.

500+ RE-OCCUPYING LIBERTY SQUARE RIGHT NOW! JOIN US! #OWS #SPRING

— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallSt) March 18, 2012

The crowd appeared to grow throughout the night, as evidenced by live footage broadcast over journalist Tim Pool's UStream page. Mr. Pool aired a "human mic" invoking calls for a "general strike" as well as an instance of a form of "direct action"--protesters linking arms and charging across Liberty Square at a full run.

Waves of marchers continued to fill the park well into the night. Around 10:30 p.m. it looked as though some protesters were attempting to set up tents as chants such as "We are not leaving" and "Occupy the food supply" rippled through the crowd.

Batman vs OWS

So Commissioner Gordon is going to get fired by the mayor because he a war hero, and this is peace time? And Anne Hathaway literally spouts off some OWS rhetoric during a masquerade ball:"Because when it's all over, you and your friends are going to wonder how you ever lived so large, and leave so little for the rest of us."

Well, at least Catwoman is part of the 99%, even if Bruce Wayne isn't.

Children + Cops = Cutest mass arrests ever! (FoxTongue)

In a very clever campaign swipe, Occupy Wall Street is now co-opting this year's trendy "anti-bullying"  message--championed by Dan Savage, Lady Gaga, and the cast of Glee-- and turned it into an "Stop Bullying Us, Ray Kelly and Michael Bloomberg" initiative. Starring your kids...marching in solidarity with the 99%! Because the police can't pepper spray children (fingers crossed).

From the OWS memo:

This Saturday, Parents for Occupy Wall Street will march with our children from Union Square to City Hall Park to deliver a “stop bullying” message to NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly and his boss, Mayor Michael Bloomberg.  This event will mark International Human Rights Day. The children will place 5,000 paper hearts, one for each peaceful protester arrested nationwide over the past three months, in the center of the park.

WHEN/WHERE: Saturday, December 10th, in Union Square at 11 AM, the children will hold a General Assembly, and paint the paper hearts.  At 12:30pm, we will march down Broadway to Foley Sq. (State Supreme Court) and then to City Hall Park, arriving at approximately 2 PM.

“We teach our children at home and in schools that bullying is wrong,” said Mark Hamilton of Parents for Occupy Wall St. “The violence by some in the NYPD against peaceful protesters is confusing our children; we are left to explain unprofessional and inexcusable actions.”

“As proud New Yorkers, we’ve watched in disbelief as some of New York’s finest have stepped above the law and used excessive force against citizens,” said Kirby Desmarais, who organized a slumber party at Liberty Square in October. “New York is not a police state and we stand against this misconduct."

Parents for Occupy Wall Street is a community of parents and organizations who support Occupy Wall Street. #POWS encourages all parents to stand united and march with their families, joining occupiers, students, unions and New Yorkers of all walks of life, to demand that our law enforcement officers act appropriately and responsibly when serving their public.

Yikes. We're not sure that comparing the entire NYPD force is exactly the right tactic OWS should be taking right now. Nor is using small children has a human shield when these protests have an approximately 40% chance of violent altercation, is a good idea either.

On the other hand: Kids with paper hearts! AWW! Mayor Bloomberg's heart just grew three sizes bigger, and now he'll give back Zuccotti Park as Christmas present to all the WhOWS in WhOWSville.

(Photo via FoxTongue)

The library as it once was. (Photo: David Shankbone)

"Oh, my god, look at those books,” said a bespectacled, gray-haired Occupy Wall Street sympathizer. “Oh, my god,” she repeated. “This is vile.”

Squeezing into a crowded Midtown conference room, the woman joined other Occupy Wall Street volunteers and reporters for a crowded press conference hosted by civil rights attorney Norman Siegel. A small hill of books was piled on a table, presided over by the peeved librarians of Occupy Wall Street. They gathered to demand explanations: for the sorry state of their collection, for the destruction of four library laptops and for more than 2,500 books they say are still missing.

Of the books recovered many of them were in “shapes I never thought a book could take,” as one volunteer described it. A copy of Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas looked as if it had been steeped in a puddle. Jack Kerouac’s On the Road had acquired an accordion fold down its middle. And there, as if it were a prop, was a roughed-up copy of Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451.

For Mayor Bloomberg, all this did not look good at all. The Bloomberg administration seemed to sense it had touched a nerve early on, when his office hastily posted on Twitter an assurance that the city had stored the books safely following the abrupt, predawn raid at the park on Nov. 15. According to the message, the books could be picked up the next morning at the sanitation garage on West 57th Street, and there was an accompanying photo, showing stacks of intact volumes.

But when Occupy Wall Street’s librarians, whose ranks include graduate students studying library science, working librarians and professors on sabbatical, went to pick up the confiscated books, they found only a fraction of their library intact.

“What the mayor’s office was putting out was that the books are safely stored,” said Michele Hardesty, an English professor at Hampshire College who has been volunteering at the library while on sabbatical this year. “But those books were just pulled out of a trash pile. There’s no possibility that it can be spun that what they were doing was confiscating and storing property.”

“All the books, as well as other items, were transported from the park directly to the sanitation garage, where they were unloaded and sorted,” wrote Julie Wood, a spokeswoman for the mayor, in an email. “Anyone who wasn’t able to find any item, or found an item that was damaged, was given a claim form to file with the comptroller’s office, for potential reimbursement.”

The Occupy Wall Street library, also known as the People’s Library, was one of the earliest fixtures in the makeshift village that sprang up in Zuccotti. It began humbly, as a pile of law books under a tarp.

Books retrieved from the sanitation garage.

“There was a pile of books and a sign that said ‘library,’” said Betsy Fagin, whose most recent job was as a librarian at the National Art Library in London. “I looked around and I asked around and nobody seemed to be in charge of it and I thought, ‘I should be in charge of it, because I’m a librarian.’ And that’s how it got rolling.”

Ms. Fagin and other volunteers proposed a library working group at the General Assembly, and soon book donations started coming in.

“It would get bigger and bigger almost every day,” said Hristo Voynov, who volunteered at the library. “At first we had cardboard boxes and then bins. Cardboard boxes, they didn’t really work out well in the rain since whenever we used tarps to cover the books the police would tear them off when it was raining. It was their way of bullying us.” After transferring the books to donated plastic bins, they were soon kept under a tent Mr. Voynov said was a gift from Patti Smith.

According to the statistics cited at the press conference, the library eventually received more than 5,000 donated books, the full catalog of which is still available online at Library Thing. Books were entered into the library catalog by ISBN number, and checkout operated on the honor system.

“There was no checkout process of any kind at all; the only books we asked people not to take were books in our reference section,” said William Scott, a professor on sabbatical from the University of Pittsburgh and a library volunteer. He said the reference section also included more valuable books, such as a book of poems signed by poet laureate Philip Levine. “There were signed copies by authors and none of that collection has been recovered. There has been maybe one or two titles but all of those books are gone,” said Mr. Scott.

Librarians estimate there were some 4,000 books in its boxes on the night of the raid, but the city has suggested protestors were given time to remove the books.

“The protestors were given the opportunity take their possessions with them,” wrote Ms. Wood in an email. “Many took their possessions with them, others chose to leave items.”

Speaking at the press conference, one librarian who was present that night, Stephen Boyer, countered that protesters never had a chance.

“I was there when the raid happened,” said Mr. Boyer, who lived in the library for one and a half months. “It was sprung on us in such a crazy way that I pretty much grabbed the poetry anthologies, which are very one-of-a-kind, and my personal stuff.” He said he was under the impression that he would be able to come back for a second load. “I took my stuff to my friend’s house around the corner and I tried to get back to get more stuff because I can only carry so much on me and the police officers wouldn’t let us back into the park to get anything else.”

Since the raid the librarians have taken to bringing mobile carts to marches and demonstrations, and storing extra books at the United Federation of Teachers building when they are not at the park.

“We’re pretty determined and we’re not going anywhere,” said Mr. Voynov.

Mandy Henk, a librarian at DePauw university who has driven from Indiana to visit the occupation during school breaks, said what the librarians would like most from Mr. Bloomberg is an explanation of what happened to the books, replacement of the full library catalog and a space in which to revive the People’s Library as a stationary entity.

“Our collection was curated by the movement,” she said, “so it’s pretty special.”

ewitt@observer.com

No bikes allowed in Zuccotti (Photo via AnimalNY)

Has the Occupy Wall Street movement fizzled out? Certainly the stories have moved: While Philadelphia and Los Angeles have handed their Occupiers eviction notices (but haven't moved them out yet), and some protesters have moved down to Miami for Art Basel, we notice that it's been awfully silent over at Zuccotti Park recently.

A lot of people are speculating on what OWS can do next, or where the movement is going...which is a sure sign that journos have hit a lull on breaking news in NYC.

Maybe that's because the new restrictions Brookfield has put on the Zuccotti Park ever since the raid on September 15th make it impossible to spend any long period of time. No sleeping bags, no sleeping, no closing your eyes while standing up. And now, no bikes: Bucky Turco from AnimalNY put up a video yesterday he shot down at Zuccotti, where an officer tells him that bicycles are banned from the park because they could be used as weapons.

Deadly Chairs, Bikes Are Banned from Liberty Plaza from ANIMALnewyork.com on Vimeo.

We're not sure if this applies to camera equipment as well (which could be swung like a mace or used to hit someone like a baton, we guess), though the lack of photos coming out of the park recently seem to say so. The last photos Getty Images posted from the area were November 17th, The Day of Action.

And what about that Thanksgiving dinner we were invited to in Zuccotti? The 3,000 individually wrapped meals (due to the kitchen shutdown) didn't make for much of a party, and was scarcely covered.

While programs like OccupyYourBlock.org prepared for such eventualities as physical Occupations being shut down, there's no denying that the relative radio silence after the events earlier this month belie a dip in the movement's moral. Or maybe just the news organizations covering them.

“There were people smoking crack, people with puppies begging for money, we looked like shit,” Jake yelled to the police. “Now what do we look like? Peaceful protesters getting our asses kicked. This is the best thing that could have happened. There are thousands of people watching us.”

Jake’s remarks proved prescient. In the eight days since the predawn NYPD raid, the Occupy movement has emerged with newfound political muscle and support of some of the city’s biggest unions. Mayor Bloomberg took the park from the protesters, but he also solved many of the problems that consumed organizational energy at Zuccotti: food, shelter and keeping their community safe from the more volatile elements in the park. As long as occupiers made holding ground in the park their main objective, the movement appeared caught in an unending battle against police, winter weather and a steady string of homeless and mentally ill New Yorkers who showed up for the free food and shelter. Then came the dramatic raid, and the protest went from an eyesore to a political cause célèbre. Now, demonstrators are spreading their message at events all around the city, joined by a new-found army of politicians and union leaders eager to score political points and attach themselves to the movement.

Less than 12 hours after police swept through Zuccotti Park in a cloud of pepper spray and swinging batons, several of the likely candidates vying to replace Mayor Bloomberg in 2013 piled on the OWS bandwagon, blasting him for the show of force and his efforts to obstruct reporters from witnessing the eviction.

“Today’s actions include reports of excessive force by the NYPD, and reports of infringement of the rights of the press. If these reports are true, these actions are unacceptable,” said City Council Speaker Christine Quinn in a statement following Tuesday’s raid.

“Zuccotti Park is not Tiananmen Square,” said Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer in a rival statement.

“The administration should have let the situation in Zuccotti Park play out. There were still opportunities to resolve outstanding issues, including finding an alternative site that would have proved less problematic,” said Public Advocate Bill de Blasio.

Ms. Quinn also showed up on the steps of City Hall on Wednesday at noon for a press conference with Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez, who was arrested during the raid. Wading into even more dangerous territory (and marking an undeniable sea change with regard to post-9/11 deference to law enforcement), Ms. Quinn raised questions of police misconduct on Mr. Rodriguez’s behalf.

“We need answers to these questions: Why was he pushed to the ground? Why was he held in a van for two hours when no one else was in that van with him? Why did he ask to see a supervisor and was never granted that right? Among other questions, those are troubling, troubling questions. Why was his attorney not given the ability to see him?” Ms. Quinn said, very troubled indeed.

But none of the potential mayoral candidates could match the rhetoric of Comptroller John Liu, who in addition to the developments at Zuccotti had the added inconvenience of seeing one of his fund-raisers arrested by the FBI on Wednesday afternoon.
“It is simply outrageous that City Hall felt it necessary to swoop in on Zuccotti Park under cover of the dark of night and to show up with such an incredible show of force somewhat similar to the shock and awe that was employed in Iraq,” declaimed Mr. Liu. “It’s 2011, not 1984, and yet, we hear more and more of this Orwellian doublespeak coming from City Hall. This has to end.”

Clever.

Ignoring the gibe, Mayor Bloomberg’s deputy for communications, Howard Wolfson, said the criticism of police tactics missed the central question of the raid—whether protesters should have been allowed to maintain their tent city indefinitely. It’s a question that even some of Zuccotti’s supporters might have trouble answering truthfully, despite widespread opposition about the underhanded way the eviction was carried out.

“I was shocked at the statements put out by many of those who say they are going to be running for mayor,” Mr. Wolfson said. “The central issue before this mayor at this time was whether or not the tenting and tarping and camping can continue at Zuccotti Park. And not a single statement by any of the mayoral aspirants addressed that central issue.”

The only person who has officially launched his mayoral campaign, longshot candidate and local media mogul Tom Allon, told The Observer Mr. Wolfson was the one dodging the issues.

“Deputy Mayor Wolfson’s attempt to spin the administration’s dead of night, military-style raid on sleeping protesters into a health and safety issue simply doesn’t conform with reality. Rather than worrying about the 2013 mayoral race, Wolfson should be explaining to the public why, over the last two days, roughing up and arresting journalists for daring to report on Occupy Wall Street has appeared to become a matter of policy,” Mr. Allon said.

As politicians jockeyed over the circumstances surrounding the raid, the debate over tenting was already becoming moot. On Tuesday night in Zuccotti Park, protesters met for the first General Assembly following the end of their encampment. A large crowd packed tightly into the newly uncluttered space for an account of what had happened and a discussion about what was next. Many of those present had been awake through the previous night. Some were sprawled out napping on Zuccotti’s Tetris-like, geometric benches under honey locust trees whose leaves had recently changed to a piercing yellow. A light drizzle fell, as the occupiers began to unveil the next phase of the movement, including plans to move beyond Zuccotti Park and to capitalize on the newfound political support generated by the severity of the raid.
“Last night was really hard,” said the convener of the General Assembly (“LAST NIGHT WAS REALLY HARD,” echoed the crowd). “We lost a lot (WE LOST A LOT). But we have so much more (BUT WE HAVE SO MUCH MORE).”

“They showed us their power (THEY SHOWED US THEIR POWER),” the occupiers said. “And we’re showing them ours. (AND WE’RE SHOWING THEM OURS.)” The people’s microphone dissolved into cheers.

Unoccupied.

On Thursday, the protesters entered the postraid phase of the movement with a slate of citywide events celebrating the two-month anniversary of Occupy Wall Street. The actions of Nov. 17 had been planned for days, but Mr. Bloomberg’s decision to eliminate the tent city certainly seemed to catalyze the movement’s weekend warriors and centrists into action, as protesters debuted their new, mobile occupation.

OWS scheduled events throughout the city separated into morning, afternoon, and evening sessions it referred to as breakfast, lunch and dinner. From before sunrise, protesters amassed not in Zuccotti Park, which continues to be barricaded and surrounded by police officers, but across the street, in the plaza in front of the Brown Brothers Harriman building. When The Observer arrived on the scene shortly after 7 a.m., several hundred protesters were filling the plaza. They carried signs, finding inspiration in everything from a photo of Gandhi to Jay-Z (“the one percent have 99 problems and this bitch is one”). There were signs that read “empathy” and “tear down this wall,” and a picture of a melting ice cap over the words “can you feel it trickle down?”

Many protesters were clearly prepared for the possibility of arrest: some wore goggles or had gas masks in the event the police again deployed pepper spray or tear gas, and volunteers wove through the crowd distributing the phone number of the New York chapter of the National Lawyer’s Guild. Given the hundreds of protesters packed into the square, the protection afforded to the nearly vacant Zuccotti across the street seemed nonsensical.

One protester climbed atop the black marble memorial to real estate mogul and convicted tax evader Harry Helmsley, “whose richness of spirit and love for New York helped build this great city.” While others secured his feet to keep him balanced, he deployed the call-and-repeat people’s microphone to explain that the protest would be splitting into two groups, one following a black flag and one following a green flag. In these separate groups, protesters attempted to occupy the intersections surrounding Wall Street as commuters arrived for work.

The Observer witnessed the scene at Pine and Nassau, where approximately 50 protesters arranged themselves into a sit-in in the street. Police emerged from behind a barricade and over a loudspeaker ordered protesters to vacate the street or face arrest. Gym goers in the Equinox overlooking the scene abandoned their Pilates balls and gathered at the windows to watch. The police moved swiftly, neatly vacuuming up approximately 20 protesters, spiriting them behind barricades and tying their wrists with zip cuffs. As the arrests proliferated, protesters sang “We Shall Overcome,” and those who had obeyed orders to move to the sidewalks chanted “Shame.” Retired Philadelphia police captain Ray Lewis, in uniform, whom officers led cuffed down Nassau Street in front of the assembled crowd, received a loud ovation.

For “lunch” students gathered in Union Square for a rally. Other protesters took to the subways, distributing leaflets and chanting. “Dinner” was a gathering at Foley Square that drew an estimated 20,000 to 30,000 people (the numbers vary depending who one asks, and the NYPD no longer does crowd estimates), and culminated in a march across the Brooklyn Bridge. The protest was largely peaceful, and benefited from the presence of unions, which have been a significant presence at Occupy since an Oct. 5 march that drew thousands of members.

The evening protest was markedly more diverse, drawing an older and more racially varied group than the morning’s activities. Even the sit-ins took on a more institutional character: a group of 99 Occupy Wall Street protesters including Councilman Jumaane Williams, Councilwoman Melissa Mark Viverito and George Gresham, the president of chapter 1199 of United Healthcare Workers East, were arrested for sitting down on the street at the foot of the bridge. Union leaders also obtained a permit for the march, and many participants wore gear identifying them as members of local unions including the UAW, UFT, CWA and 1199 SEIU.

A woman named Angela Sanchez, who described herself as a representative of 1199, sought out reporters in the crowded square. She told The Observer about her union’s support for the protests. Unlike the original occupiers, the health care workers have very focused demands.

“We’re constantly under threat of layoffs. Right now, they’re threatening to take away our health care,” Ms. Sanchez said. “Everyone’s pretty up in arms that there would be healthcare workers without healthcare.”

As they squeezed out of Foley Square and passed the gates of City Hall at the foot of the bridge, protesters passed 1199 members wearing T-shirts identifying them as “marshalls” for the march who cheered them on. On the walkway leading to the bridge, the union marshalls formed a human gate, standing between the protesters and police officers who lined the road on either side. The march went off without a hitch, and a light projecting huge letters on the nearby Verizon building declared the movement victorious.
“We are winning,” it said.

“Mayor Bloomberg beware; Zuccotti Park is everywhere,” the protesters chanted.

Labor’s support for Occupy Wall Street hasn’t been confined to large protests. Both 1199 and the UFT have provided occupiers office space to hold their spokescouncils and working groups in the aftermath of their eviction from Zuccotti Park.

On Friday, former governor David Paterson had the current governor, Andrew Cuomo, on his radio show and the two discussed the still-growing movement. Governor Paterson discussed the march and the effect union’s were having on the movement.

“I was very happy to see that toward the end of the day when they connected with Union 1199, and the Verizon workers, and the transport workers,” Governor Paterson said. “The fact is, they know how to march, they know how to engage the police, they know the process, and they really brought, toward the end of the day, some reasonable, you know, deliberateness to the group. And it’s amazing, when you have leadership, you can organize a group and you have far less confrontations.”

Unions and politicians might provide Occupy Wall Street with logistical support and institutional credibility, but will a movement that began as a leaderless expression of frustration with the financial industry survive an influx of would-be leaders bearing their own agendas?

At Zuccotti Park on Sunday afternoon, we saw evidence protesters might give a prickly reception to the politicians and union leaders attempting to occupy their movement. Several hundred supporters thronged the now tent-free park. Holiday lights had been strung through the trees but the barricades and police checkpoints still stood.

“What we’ve seen is they’re just trying to get face time more than anything,” said Sam Uddin, who was attending a meeting of Occupy Wall Street’s Politics and Electoral Reform working group. He emphasized he spoke of his personal views rather than those of the movement, but pointed out that Representative Charles Rangel was booed when he showed up at the Foley Square rally last week.

“How can we expect these politicians to reform themselves? It’s not in their best interest to be reformed,” said Mr. Uddin. “Rangel is the epitome of what’s wrong with our system. He’s so corrupt.”
Tony Cochran, who is involved with Occupy Harlem, showed more equanimity about the politicians’ involvement. “It can be a good thing and it can be a bad thing,” he said. “It depends what their intentions are.”

Whether or not the politicians and unions are allowed to stay along for the ride, the Occupy Wall Street protesters plan to continue staging events all over the city now that they have lost their perch in the park. Throughout Zuccotti on Sunday, people discussed plans for a smorgasbord of Occupy activities planned for points far and wide. A faction of Occupiers traveled to the Upper East Side to form a drum circle outside of Mayor Bloomberg’s townhouse. Working groups met in the atrium of 60 Wall Street to discuss future actions. An anti-stop and frisk rally was held in Queens. At the New School, a sit-in was underway and a candlelit march was scheduled to leave from Washington Square Park and travel to Sixth Avenue and Canal Street. On Monday, Occupy Student Debt, an Occupy Wall Street offshoot, protested the board of trustees’ meeting at CUNY and launched a national student-debt refusal campaign.

Jesse LaGreca, the Daily Kos writer who gained Internet fame for telling off a Fox News reporter in the early days of the occupation, said that the loss of the tents at Zuccotti will not threaten the movement. “I think the encampment is the physical manifestation of the conversation we’re trying to have,” he said. “But it’s more about the ideas.

“Phase Two of Occupy Wall Street is what I’ve been calling this,” he continued. “It’s more about creating consciousness. He mentioned plans to travel to Washington, D.C., to occupy Congress from Dec. 5 to Dec. 9 and a day of action in solidarity with Occupy Oakland on Dec. 12. “Our problems aren’t going away any time soon and neither are we.”