by Davey D 

So the weekend dubbed  ‪#‎FergusonOctober‬  is over. Thousands took to the streets of St Louis on Saturday. They attended big rallies and concerts on Sunday. St Louis University campus was occupied by the  Lost Voices  folks and a demonstration kicked off. Folks confronted police at Quik Mart, Baseball games and football games. They shut down city hall and jammed up an upscale mall and protested in front of Walmart.

Hundreds of people in the pouring rain accompanied clergy to the Ferguson police department where a roll call of scores of people killed this year by police was read off with a request for police to step forward, confess and repent.

The clergy members were met with silence and a bit of hostility.

When folks attempted to cross the police line to meet with the police chief in an act of Civil Disobedience, police officers in riot gear started yelling that they were being assaulted and would charge them with that crime if they continued. Eventually 10 people were led off in handcuffs including Cornel West and Carl Dix of the Communist Party. They were later released.

The plan was for clergy to show solidarity with those on the ground dealing with police terrorism around the murders of Mike Brown and now Vonderrick Myers.  They were going to fill the jails the way Martin Luther King, Jr. and supporters did during the height of the Civil Rights Movements. The jails were not filled.

The question now is where do we go from here? It’s not so much a question directed at folks in Ferguson, who will have to deal with an array of issues ranging from growing pains as a movement, to how they execute particular strategies both long and short term. They will have to figure out what sort of pressure to apply to make sure officer Darren Wilson is arrested, tried and convicted. Nationally speaking, he is becoming less and less of a household name with each passing day. How does that change?

They will have to figure out how to hold police departments accountable in surrounding cities like Pagedale and Jennings which have seen 5 or 6 hangings and attempted hangings in their holding cells since Mike Brown was murdered. Almost all the victims were in jail for traffic violations and if you believe the police accounts, they all killed or tried to kill themselves.

Folks in Ferguson and St Louis will have to figure out what sort of ways they can change the tactic used by police to pull over folks, hand out dubious traffic tickets and then charge residents thousands of dollars in court fees and fines. It has been pointed out that the newly built police station in Ferguson was paid for by all the fines collected for traffic violation levied on local Black residents.

The point is that folks in St Louis have their work cut out for them. Oppressive attitudes and systems will have to be pushed back on and eventually overhauled; How that happens remains to be seen.

But again the question at hand for everyone else is what next? Ferguson is ground zero because it was in the news as a result of the ‘riots’/ rebellions after Brown was shot and killed, but police terrorism has not slowed down in the least all over the country. From Beavercreek, Ohio to New York City to Oakland, California to Houston, Texas there is incident after incident’ What do we collectively do next?

There is an election that is less than a month away? How will all this impact that date? Are candidates being targeted? Are they being questioned?

Former political prisoner and Black Panther  Dhoruba Bin-Wahad  at a recent gathering urged folks to address police accountability locally and use upcoming elections as a way to chin-check folks on policies ranging from the way policies are executed from block to block on down to pushing to make sure cops are required to live in the cities they patrol. There are numerous buttons to push legislatively. He urged us not to cede ground in that area.

For example, in Oakland, Ca there is hotly contested Mayoral race where many of the candidates have been expressing the desire to add more police. How will that be countered as we move toward the November contest? Some of those running for Mayor have stifled bills that would strengthen police review boards and give citizens tools to punish police. Local journalist  Eric Arnold  has written about this and pointed out candidates who are responsible for this.. What will be our response? Are people aware of the upcoming October 20th deadline in Cali to register to vote?

In San Jose there’s a hotly contested Mayoral race where the main topic is how to get police to stay in the city of San Jose which has taken away major incentives for police. How will folks down there weigh in on that election?

Each city has something jumping off? What have we studied, what have we learned about DAs and judges running for office?

Outside of voting we have other things to consider. There have been lots of organizations holding classes letting folks know about their rights and how to conduct yourself when stopped by police to lessen the danger. Many are being taught how to deal with tax payer police before they are learning about the birds and the bees. That’s how dire the situation has gotten.

Others are arming themselves with cameras to film the police and doing neighborhood watches. Think about that for a minute. Neighborhood watches to protect against police..Will this help stop the madness? What will be the punishment and who will issue it if cops are caught on tape violating citizen’s rights?

Some are saying it’s about armed resistance and self defense strategies. If that’s a tactic how are folks preparing? Are folks training? If so in what ways? What lessons from the past were learned? What is applicable today? Certainly they aren’t posting up such actions on social media especially at a day and time where everything is monitored.

Still others are pushing to wake up folks and make them more aware. It was inspiring to see so many got on planes and buses to come to Ferguson, but was it enough? Were all hands on deck? Were our family and friends and folks living on our block aware and concerned

Thousands hit the streets but many more thousands were at the local football and baseball games in St Louis. Do those people need to be on deck in order to change what is impacting us? If so how do we reach them? How do we reach them when local and national media has moved on? We’re now talking about Ebola not Ferguson.

Possible next steps for folks to consider? For starters, as a short term strategy I would encourage folks to make police terrorism and accountability an issue that anyone running for office in your local area have to address. From mayor to city council to school board, each of us should have hard questions about what those vying for office plan to do?

Folks can take it a step further by visiting a local campaign office or the official office of those holding seats. If Ferguson and police violence is on your mind, it should be on the minds of everyone who benefits from our tax dollars.. Police unions have made themselves known and felt to politicians how about us.

Long term we should all take some time out to read and re-read books on past movements, watch documentaries, talk with elders and start developing new tactics that make sense for 2014. We should study the way King and his SCLC cohorts studied Ghandi and others.

We should politically educate ourselves the way the Panthers and SNCC did. We should have a politic behind our actions. Does marching work? If so in what way in 2014? Does going to jail work in an act of civil disobedience? If so, how? Can we appeal to the moral compass of those brutalizing us? That was tried in Ferguson. Did it work? Is it a viable tactic? How does one carry that out?

Do we economically impact folks? What does that look like? Shutting down ports? boycotting stores? Boycotting cities? Is there a way to economically starve police?

For me personally what always bothered me about police showing up in riot gear and in mass numbers, 500 deep for demonstrations, was all the overtime that was being paid out. Here in Oakland, you have some officers making over 120k a year for monitoring marches while wearing riot gear and brandishing new weapons.

When folks were arrested at these demonstrations our resources went to paying excessive bails to spring folks and later to pay for lawyers and court costs. Even when the Clergy were arrested there was a call for folks to contribute to their bail fund. Seems to me lots of folks in the police terrorism food chain were getting paid. What’s our strategy to end that? That’s a long term strategy to think about.

As noted earlier, we know the police have a strategy to pay for new equipment and buildings. It’s played out in places like Ferguson in the form of hitting folks with excessive fines and fees for traffic violations. In other places its abusing Civil Forfeiture laws where police take your money and car under the suspicion of you being a drug dealer even if you are not convicted.  Those laws  need to be changed.

Anyway that’s my two cents for the day. Lets create something that goes beyond our wildest and most inspiring dreams.

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Davey D is a nationally recognized journalist, adjunct professor, Hip Hop historian, syndicated talk show host, radio programmer, producer, deejay, media and community activist.