I wrote a column this week about the fact that Robert Johnston had said he intended to reinstitute the Occupy Little Rock demonstration at 4th and Ferry with a weekly sit-in. He had his first sit-in today. His report:

20 adults, 3 kids, 2 dogs, and several flags met/ sat-in for an hour today at 4th and Ferry.

The general consensus was that the 1% have more than their share of political and economic power.

The group will meet/demonstrate/protest again next Wednesday at 6 pm and next Thursday at 9 am

We invite others to join. Bring a lawn chair.

We discussed the City of Littlle Rock, the Tech Park, national, state, and local politics and economics

For more info email robertj1940@hotmail.com [Robert Johnston]

• Chancellor Joel Anderson

Leslie Newell Peacock is covering today's meeting of the Little Rock Technology Park Authority. Members of the authority have now voluntarily filed financial interest statements and they eventually will be available on-line. Until the law is changed to require such filing, there is, of course, no recourse against members who don't file or don't file complete or accurate reports.

Here's what I wanted to note right away:

Three of the four Occupy Little Rock protesters who were arrested today went straight to the meeting of the Tech Park Authority. If there's a better place to stand up to corporate dominance of the politica process, I can't think of one. This taxpayer-financed agency was created and is controlled and administered by the corporate-agenda lobby known as the Little Rock Regional Chamber of Commerce, taxpayer-subsidized but public unaccountable. The new agency is looking hungrily at booting hundreds of low-income minority citizens from their homes. Documents dislodged by a Freedom of Information Act request only contribute to circumstantial evidence that a neighborhood across Interstate 630 from UAMS is in the crosshairs.

More later.

UPDATE: It was a good day for the Little Rock Technology Park Authority, with a real estate attorney rising from the audience to tell the board that he represents 40 people with property in the Forest Hills neighborhood, the area just south of Interstate 630 under consideration for the park, and they look forward to selling. No fireworks from Occupy Little Rock, no angry outbursts from residents, support for one of the sites from the audience and Authority members UAMS and UALR got to cover their rears on negative feedback from neighborhoods.

• Brian Chilson
• CALM BEFORE THE ARRESTS: This morning at Occupy LR site.

Photographer Brian Chilson is on hand this morning for the 7 a.m. police eviction of Occupy Little Rock from its camp at 4th and Ferry Streets. Arrests are expected. Occupy LR has said those who stand their ground on the site won't forcibly resist the arrests and then will pursue legal action over the city's forced end to their free speech demonstration.

More later. Police didn't move immediately at the expiration of the group's permit at 7 a.m. Speeches were in progress at 7:15 a.m.

UPDATE: At 8:45 a.m. still awaiting city's promised action. Occupy LR awaits.

• Brian Chilson

UPDATE: At 9:30, OLR has been reduced to making joke calls demanding police action. Not to worry.

City Manager Bruce Moore says ominously:

"We have an operational plan in place."

LRPD's Terry Hastings:

"No comment at this time."

UPDATE: In early afternoon (1 p.m.), the city's go-slow approach was working to perfection. Most media had drifted away along with many of the Occupiers and sympathizers who'd come to see a morning showdown. Most of the infrastructure for the camp was removed (water, solar panels, generators) and a great deal of cleanup was done with city dumpsters. Some tents and portable toilets remain, but they won't provide much by way of amenities. Spirits were down among those hoping for the "closure" of a group arrest. Some city police vehicles were marshaled at City Hall. I'd still expect a final sweep and cleanup at a point when attendance on-sight is small and attention from the public is slight. You have to credit the city for its cagey approach, much as a head-busting mowdown undoubtedly would have pleased some of the more authoritarian types on the board and in the community.

PS — Former state Rep. Robert Johnston, a political activist, has a comment on City Director Lance Hines' latest. (Hine put the eviction process in motion because his Chenal Valley sensibilities were offended by the sight of tents on a gravel parking lot.)

• BREAKING CAMP: Tents were coming down Tuesday at Occupy Little Rock's camp.

• Brian Chilson
• LET FREEDOM RING: Speech is No. 1, Occupy LR members said at City Hall.

As expected, city officials said any private property owner who'd agreed to provide a spot for relocation of the Occupy Little Rock camp would face zoning problems if they accommodated tents. So, a plan to use a vacant lot downtown, or near downtown, is now out of the picture for the group.

That means that Little Rock police will move on the expiration of the group's permit at 7 a.m. tomorrow morning. Though most of the camp is being struck today, a few tents wil be in place then for symbolic reasons and a small group of Occupy LR people will be on hand and refuse to end their 1st Amendment right of free assembly and speech. They say they'll peacefully submit to arrest.

Legal action will follow, Occupy LR indicated at a Tuesday evening news conference. ACLU-cooperating attorneys are prepared to represent members of the group both in defending their arrests and, afterward, filing a legal action over the arbitrary permitting process that led to the city's eviction decision. The group has been camping on a parking lot at 4th and Ferry since October in solidarity with a national movement demonstrating against corporate influence over politics. City officials have generally tolerated the group, but city directors, led by Lance Hines, who lives in West Little Rock, have grown increasingly irritated at the sight of the camp. That led to a deadline for the group to move. The city said the precipitating reason was a need for the parking lot for bus parking for Riverfest and other visitors.

The City Board meets tonight. Occupy LR sought, but wasn't given, a spot on the agenda, which comes with an open-ended time commitment. They'll be allowed to speak during the limited forum provided for public comment.

Occupy Little Rock, which had said yesterday it would sue today to block its eviction from its six-month protest site at 4th and Ferry, has put off action for 24 hours and delayed a news conference that had been scheduled for 5 p.m. today.

It says negotiations are continuing with the city on an alternate protest site. The city has said it wants the current site for parking during Riverfest and the summer tourist season. Said a release:

Occupy Little Rock believes that a good deal with the city is still attainable and hopes for a push back of a few days concerning the May 16th 7:00 am eviction from the current protest site.

A private, nonprofit has signaled a willingness for Occupy LR to use some vacant property it owns in central Little Rock. That would be a win for the city and Occupy. But I'm guessing city zoning rules will be a factor in that relocation, too.

• NOT DONE PROTESTING: Occupy Little Rock, shown here at an earlier Capitol rally, isn't ready to give up.

Occupy Little Rock, scheduled for eviction from its 4th and Ferry camp by the city of Little Rock at 7 a.m. Wednesday, isn't ready to give up.

Spokesman Greg Deckelman said the group will file suit Monday for an injunction to stop the eviction. The suit will contend the city has acted arbitrarily and will proceed unconstitutionally if it moves ahead with the forced closure of the camp as promised Wednesday morning.

Occupy LR will have a news conference about its actions at 5 p.m. Monday at City Hall and also plans to ask to be heard Tuesday night by the City Board. It has been negotiating for several weeks with City Manager Bruce Moore about an alternative camping spot. The city contends it needs the parking lot the group has been using for auxiliary parking for Riverfest on Memorial Day weekend.

UPDATE: Occupy LR announced Monday afternoon that it would delay action and the news conference for 24 hours to continue to work with the city in hopes of finding a new protest site.

Occupy Little Rock has been working on obtaining permission to use private property as a new location for its base of protest and has made progress on a site. But it said it can't complete arrangements by Wednesday morning.

Police barricades around the existing camp have come down and much of the tent city has already been dismantled. Police are prepared to arrest Occupy members who refuse to leave Wednesday morning. Arrests are expected, though my understanding is that the expectation is that they will be done peacefully without resistance, perhaps even with coffee and doughnuts for the police. A symbolic arrest of an LR Nine of occupiers was discussed at one point.

If I know the authoritarian bent of the city directors who've been irked for weeks by the protest camp by the freeway, this will irk them even further. Expect some stern lectures from them about these agitators if given a chance at Tuesday's board meeting. Too bad. These directors could learn something from the determined, mannerly and well-informed activism that has marked the Occupy LR action from the start of its action in October. The most disgruntled board members — and Occupy has some supporters on the board, by the way — remind me of nothing so much as the sort of teenagers who got so offended by long hair in the 1960s that they gathered accomplices to forcibly cut the hair of those who dared to present an appearance that didn't conform to the norm. You'd think history would teach you can tear down tents and arrest dirty hippies and cut hair, but you can't eradicate speech or ideas, not even with guns.

Occupy LR has been meeting with attorneys and, as in other endeavors, doesn't enter the next phase of protest unprepared.

PS — Funny. Bill Keller of NY Times is writing here about Chinese dissidents. But ...

Dissidents are difficult. They moralize. They don’t compromise. They don’t know when to shut up. They don’t see the Big Picture. All the qualities that made them dissidents in the first place can make them irritants ...

• Ruthie Mahone, Laura Young, Phyllis Johnson and Cindy Ante protest at City Hall.

Along with all the boosters campaigning for their candidates outside the Pulaski County Regional Building at 501 W. Markham, the "We Shall Not Be Moved" group and members of Occupy Little Rock are holding signs in front of City Hall protesting the Little Rock Technology Park Authority's decision to level a residential area for the park.

East down Markham, in front of the Capital Hotel, a sea of red-shirted Windstream employees — members of the Communications Workers of America — were marching and holding signs with such slogans as "Thieving Bastards" and "Retirees Got the Shaft" as the Windstream stockholders met in the hotel. The union is protesting Windstream's severe cutback in company contributions to employees' health insurance premiums. Once paying as much as 90 percent of the premiums, Windstream now contributes only $80 no matter how long a worker has been with the company. Employees — including retired workers, whose contribution was once only 10 percent — now are picking up premiums ranging from $700 to $1,100, spokesperson Linda James said. There were about 75 to 80 Windstream protesters, many of whom had ridden six hours on a bus from Dallas to participate in the protest.

• Communications Workers of America, protesting at the Capital Hotel

• OCCUPY LR: Setting up camp, a photo from Occupy LR's Facebook page.

Occupy Little Rock, the long-running encampment that was subject of some exasperation on the part of members of the Little Rock City Board of Directors recently, has drafted a response.

Among others, it explains for those who didn't understand the group's core motivation — "the undue influence the ultra-wealthy and corporations now have in elections and public policy."

Does that help, Director Fortson?

As for Director Erma Hendrix's characterization of the protest group as "garbage," the statement responded with sadness and a suggestion that she reconsider "in light of the fact that many of her constituents clearly understand our work, and that we are fighting against factors that affect all Americans, but always fall most heavily on those who have been traditionally marginalized."

Amen to that, too.

The full statement follows:

What OLR has to say to critics everywhere:
We are PRO-CAPITALIST
We are PRO-CONSTITUTION
We are NOT anarchists
About 90% of us HAVE JOBS & those that do not form the heart of the movement
We are NOT drug abusing, dirty, or looking for hand-outs
We ARE FIGHTING to preserve the BILL OF RIGHTS
We ARE FIGHTING to EDUCATE the public on important issues
We ARE FIGHTING to protect LAKE MAUMELLE from contamination by the DELTIC
TIMBER CORP.
We ARE FIGHTING for TRUE REPRESENTATION by our government at the state &
federal level
We ARE FIGHTING for YOU

Fight on, brother.