FW: Sodexho Marriott Stops "No More Prisons" Show at American Uni versity

From: Manire, Aaron D (amanire@indiana.edu)
Date: Fri Feb 18 2000 - 18:06:42 MET

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    I know this is peripherally AJ, but "motherfuckers better realize that now
    is the time to self-actualize".
    Paz,
    A Dario

    > -----Original Message-----
    > Sodexho Marriott Stops "No More Prisons" Show at American University --
    > Event Was Planned to Highlight Company's Ties to Private Prison Industry
    > February 15 in Washington DC, two hundred students came to American
    > University's Mary Graydon Center to hear performers featured on the
    > forthcoming No More Prisons Hip Hop Compilation CD. But when they arrived
    > they were informed by employees of Sodexho Marriott Services (SMS), which
    > is contracted to operate the venue, that the show had been canceled.
    > David Epstein, a senior, explains that students had received all of the
    > appropriate authorizations from American University's Office of Student
    > Activities. "Three hours before the event, the SMS manager told us that
    > the university didn't give them time to prepare. They could have worked
    > with us to make the show happen. They refused to do that."
    > Students for a Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP) and Prison Moratorium Project
    > (PMP), the groups that put the show together with the support of the Drug
    > Reform Coordination Network (DRCNet), have been critical of SMS' close
    > ties to the for-profit private prison industry. According to Kevin Pranis,
    > a Soros Justice Fellow and PMP activist who was scheduled to speak at the
    > event, the French-based Sodexho group, which owns Sodexho Marriott
    > Services, is the largest investor in US private prisons through its 11%
    > holdings in Prison Realty Trust/Corrections Corporation of America.
    > Articles detailing Sodexho's prison investments, and calling on students
    > to put pressure on SMS, have appeared in a number of publications, such as
    > Infusion, which reaches over a hundred campuses throughout the US and
    > Canada.
    > Students have no evidence that these articles influenced the decision to
    > cancel the show, but they find the coincidence eerie. "I don't know that
    > the message had anything to do with it," says Epstein, "but I think it's
    > disturbing that an outside corporation can just shut down an authorized
    > student event. That's something students everywhere should be worried
    > about."
    > According to Marty Leary, a researcher for the Hotel Employees and
    > Restaurant Employees International Union (HERE), SMS has a bad record with
    > free speech issues. "It's unfortunate, but I can't say that I'm surprised.
    > This company had a rule preventing its own employees from talking to
    > outsiders about their working conditions." To avoid civil prosecution, SMS
    > recently entered into a settlement with the National Labor Relations Board
    > and agreed to drop illegal work rules.
    > Despite the initial setback, event organizers went into high gear and
    > managed to pull together equipment and transportation for a house party,
    > hosted by junior and President of AU SSDP, Kate Sanders. Sanders explains,
    > "I just felt we owed it to the artists, Apani B. Fly, Lyric and El
    > Battalion, who drove down from New York, and to all the students who
    > showed up to hear a positive and political Hip Hop message." The party
    > drew more than fifty students, and organizers say that the footage will be
    > available online within a week at <http://www.zoomculture.com/ssdp/>.
    > The No More Prisons show was organized as part of a nationwide effort to
    > protest the growing number of men and women behind bars, projected to
    > exceed two million on February 15, according to a study released by
    > Justice Policy Institute. Pranis says that the next big date will be April
    > 4, 2000, when students at campuses across the country take action against
    > Sodexho Marriott Services. For further information, visit
    > <http://www.nomoreprisons.org>.
    >
    >



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