Dozens of Occupiers evicted from building

[The Northerner]

(04-02) 15:46 PDT San Francisco -- Police on Monday afternoon began arresting Occupy activists who had taken over an empty San Francisco building the night before.

More than two dozen people had been removed from the building at 888 Turk St. by late afternoon, and it was unclear how many more remained inside. Police stormed the two-story building, which is owned by the Archdiocese of San Francisco, at about 1:45 p.m., after tearing down a barricade that protesters had built to block a main door.

The building has been used as a music education facility by the archdiocese-associated nearby school Sacred Heart Cathedral High School.

Occupy protester Beth Seligman said on Monday morning that a few hundred people came into the building and stayed the night, but police said they believed about 50 to 70 people were inside on Monday afternoon.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/04/02/BARI1NTM3V.DTL

[arcane1]

1. Thanks for the update!

I'll be walking by this on my way home, in about an hour or so, and I'm curious to see what (if anything) is going on

[freshwest]

4. You certainly live in an interesting neighborhood!

[arcane1]

14. For the past 24 hours, anyway!

I forgot to walk past, but I'm checking it out from the balcony. Not much happening now- all the banners appear to be gone, as well as the police barricades. I see what looks like a couple of police milling about, and it looks like the entrance may be blocked off.

Eh, it's a lot less interesting now

[freshwest]

15. Ah well, I hope the sun is shining there. It's blinding for us mole people up here! Nice change.

[Cleita]

2. A lawyer once told me that possession was nine-tenths of the law.

In other words if there is a dispute over occupying property, hang in there and possess your ground because it gives the evictors less ground to stand on legally.

[freshwest]

3. Do you mean squatter's rights? I believe there is a time frame necessary to claim it.

[Cleita]

6. I'm not sure. He was talking in reference to a landlord who had raised the rent on

a commercial tenant, but there was no lease, so the tenant continued to pay the old rent, so the landlord rented the space to another tenant right out from under him. The lawyer told him to hold his ground with this reasoning because if he moved his business and stuff out of there he would have no claim, but by staying there and holding his ground the landlord had less claim to evict him.

[freshwest]

8. That's not squatter's rights, more of a conflict on an established relationship. It appears that

This particular 'Occupy' was a fail. If they had a place to organize from, it would be a good thing, though. Just have to be more careful in how they do it.

[Luminous Animal]

10. The results of this action were expected.

[freshwest]

11. So the intention was merely to make a statement or get into the news?

[Luminous Animal]

12. Let me put it this way... Homes Not Jails members are very active in OSF.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homes_Not_Jails

Homes Not Jails is an American organization that emerged from two of San Francisco's prominent activist organizations Food Not Bombs and the San Francisco Tenants Union and describes itself as an all-volunteer organization committed to housing homeless people through direct action.[1] The group was formed in 1992.[2] Homes Not Jails does public actions as well as legislative advocacy and squatting (occupying empty buildings for free). Homes not jails groups do "housing takeovers", acts of civil disobedience in which vacant buildings are publicly occupied, to demonstrate the availability of vacant propertyand to advocate that it be used for housing. The group has done many such occupations. Homes Not Jails has also done and assisted with hundreds of "covert" squats in which vacant buildings are broken into so that people in need of housing can move in

[freshwest]

13. That sounds good. Something similar has been done in Ireland.

I believe they've been taking over subdivisions.

Always ticked me off to see vacant properties rotting away while people are going homeless.

It's nationwide and insane. So good for them.

[freshwest]

5. Lot of difference in the numbers cited. Doesn't matter now. Thanks, was wondering how this went.

[randome]

7. So the building wasn't the vacant, abandoned structure we originally heard about?

Hoo-boy. I bet those rich corporate clowns in Tahiti are sure afraid of us now!

[Luminous Animal]

9. The archdiocese hasn't used the building for a year and a half and has no plans to use it...

The Archdiocese of San Francisco said in a statement:

The Archdiocesan properties at 888 Turk St. and 930 Gough that have been occupied are properties for the use of Sacred Heart Cathedral Preparatory High School, which is an archdiocesan school.

SHCP is an urban high school with a campus that is compressed in an urban environment. SHCP and the Archdiocese bought these buildings five years ago to serve the students on campus in a variety of ways. Some of the buildings have been used for music and art classes until as recently as 18 months ago. These classes have been relocated to the newly built theatre arts center directly adjacent to the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption.

It is currently empty and being advertised for lease:
http://www.loopnet.com/Listing/17540742/888-Turk-Street-San-Francisco-CA/

Nice to note that the reporter's misleading language had its intended affect.