Abayomi Azikiwe, editor of the Pan-African News Wire, with members of the Moratorium NOW! Coalition from Detroit at the One Nation rally in Washington on October 2, 2010. (Photo: Alan Pollock)
Originally uploaded by Pan-African News Wire File Photos
December 3, Friday at 11 AM to 1 PM
Help leaflet Chase branches in metro Detroit calling on customers to Take the Pledge and “Bail Out of Chase” if the bank continues to exploit homeowners and farmworkers.
Join with the People Before Banks Coalition and the Moratorium NOW! Coalition to Stop Foreclosures, Evictions, and Utility Shutoffs on Friday, December 3, between 11 am and 1 pm as we leaflet Chase Bank customers at dozens of locations in the Metro Detroit area in demanding a moratorium on foreclosures and an end to the exploitation of farmworkers.
The Moratorium NOW! Coalition will be at the following branches between 11 am and 1 pm:
19301 W McNichols (at Outer Drive), Detroit , contact: 313-706-2985
611 Woodward Ave.,(Campus Martius), Detroit, contact: 313-671-3715
3044 W. Grand Blvd, (Cadillac Place, west of Woodward) , contact: 313-680-5508
And the branch below between 4 pm and 6 pm:
3300 E. Jefferson (Harbortown), Detroit, contact: 313-319-0870
To find out about other Chase leafletting locations in the metro Detroit area, please contact the PBBC staff: Rev. Charles Williams, 734-652-6382 or Joan Smith, 402-689-8878.
Feel free to leaflet the bank in your neighborhood, but let Joan know by calling her at 402-689-8878.
Attached is a "Tip Sheet" which explains the goals, process, and leafletting techniques to use, the flier to distribute to customers, "pledgeflier2.pdf", and a petition sheet to sign people up for the National moratorium on foreclosures.
From the pledgeflier leaflet:
The People Before Banks Coalition unites organized labor, faith communities and local organizations in a campaign calling on JP Morgan Chase Bank to do the right thing. Coalition leaders are asking individuals and organizations to sign a pledge to withdraw their Chase accounts and/or cancel their Chase credit cards if the bank continues to reject two actions that are morally and economically just:
1. Declare a two-year moratorium on foreclosures
As a beneficiary of billions of taxpayer dollars spent to bail out the banks, Chase should take the lead in stemming the flood tide of foreclosures sweeping the country. In communities devastated by unemployment, people need a temporary bailout scaling back their housing costs to affordable levels.
2. Sever its business ties with the RJ Reynolds Corporation if
the tobacco giant refuses to join negotiations with the Farm Labor Organizing Committee over the slave-labor working conditions at the company’s contract growers in North Carolina. Chase is RJ Reynolds’ principal creditor.
To encourage Chase Bank to take these urgent steps, we are enlisting supporters to sign a pledge to withdraw their Chase accounts and/or cancel their Chase credit cards. The UAW has already made the pledge and we are asking individuals and organizations to join this campaign.
CHASE BANK AND HOME FORECLOSURES
JP Morgan Chase is now racking up growing profits at the same time it admits to massive irregularities in the foreclosure of homes without proper documentation. Chase and other mega banks would rather rush to foreclosure when the mortgage is federally insured, collecting the full value at taxpayer expense.
Chase proclaims that it has “offered more than 900,000 mortgage modifications to troubled homeowners,” but government reports for the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP Servicer Report, August 2010) indicate that Chase has a poor record for making these modifications permanent. Chase finds it cheaper to postpone permanent modification or deny it altogether if it can collect on federal insurance for the full value of the foreclosed mortgage.
Chase has joined only a portion of Michigan’s “Helping the Hardest Hit” for the unemployed, at the same time that the bank is the prime contractor to the state of Michigan for issuing debit cards to those collecting unemployment insurance. Chase Bank, while collecting the fees from those cards, should be in the forefront of guaranteeing that the unemployed do not lose their homes. (For more information, go to http://www.moratorium-mi.org/).
REYNOLDS AMERICAN AND MIGRANT FARMWORKERS
Every year, thousands of migrant farm workers travel to North Carolina to work for tobacco growers under contract to RJ Reynolds. Many suffer from subminimum wages, corrupt crew leaders, extreme poverty, unregulated labor camps, and serious daily health risks, including nicotine poisoning and heat stroke. JP Morgan Chase is one of the lead banks in a consortium of lenders that has invested $500 million in Reynolds.
UAW President Bob King recently visited the tobacco fields with Baldemar Velasquez of the Farm Labor Organizing Committee. “Chase needs to help unemployed homeowners in Michigan and underpaid farm workers in the Carolinas,” King said on his return. “The bank could make a huge difference by suspending foreclosures and by pressuring RJ Reynolds to join negotiations with farmworkers and contract growers.” (For more information go to http://supportfloc.org/)
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The People Before Banks Coalition unites faith-based activists, community groups, and unions on behalf of social justice. Its constituent groups include the Interfaith Workers Justice Committee, the UAW, the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, Rainbow PUSH, Moratorium Now Coalition to Stop Foreclosures, Evictions, and Utility Shutoffs, and Jobs With Justice.
For more information, contact: peoplebeforebanks@gmail.com
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