The city prosecuter hand-in-hand with the Long Beach Police have gotten us evicted. Today, April 3rd, we received an eviction notice from our leasing company (Crestwave) that our lease will be terminated on May 3rd. The notice came 3 days after we received a letter from the Long Beach Prosecuters office alledging that we were in violation of several city codes. These so-called "violations" were not stated in the letter, however the letter also mentioned numerious loud noise complaints. The last time we had a show at the REACH Center was on December 28th, 2002 (4 months ago). Police officers came to this show in response to a noise complaint, stating the noise needed to be turned down, and then the police left. There was no confrontation. The situation was dealt with peacefully and respectively. The noise was turned down, the last two bands were canceled, and the show ended at approximately 8pm, 2 hours early. Since then there hasn't been a show, and police haven't come to the shop in response to any noise complaints.

On January 1st, 2003 the Long Beach CopWatch (a subsidiary of RACUN Community Defense Program) opened its third command post in Long Beach at the REACH Center (aka the Revolutionary Empowerment and Community Help Center and Long Beach Infoshoppe) located at 684 Redondo Ave. Coincidently the Long Beach Police contacted the REACH Center's leasing company, Crestwave, on the 2nd and threatened to take legal action against them if the REACH Center was not shut down. Crestwave management were told by police that when they came to the benefit show held at the REACH center on December 28th, 2002 on a noise complaint that someone tried to assualt them. An eye witness explained that police officers came to the show in response to a noise complaint, stating the noise needed to be turned down, and then the police left. There was no confrontation. This was an obvious attempt to presure the leasing company to terminate our lease.

On Saturday, April 26 there will be an "EVERYTHING MUST GO CLOSING SALE" along with a dance party.

If you would like to help the REACH Center relocate, please let us know! You can contact us at 562-434-6934 , or email us a lb_infoshoppe@yahoo.com . We are also accepting donations to help pay off our outstanding bills.



Revolutionary Empowerment and Community Help (REACH) Center
684 Redondo, Long Beach, CA 90814
lb_infoshoppe@yahoo.com

this is really the worst news i have heard in quite a bit. please, anyone go down there and just show your support or help them out! they are really great people and that was an awesome place. not for them or activist but for everyone. Lets keep the resistance going!

I have a dump truck that can be used to haul your crap and sorry asses to the city dump and I will do it for free.

if u were not such whack asses u can let it remain open by defending it

I will be there and will gladly help.

Is there any way to contest the eviction? Let's take it to court and make them go on record...


also, could you post contact info for the leasing company?

"v"

Well then, you're simply an overemotional fucking idiot.

I can't believe you're losing the infoshop. There is no other place like it, and I will definitely miss it. It's the only place that you don't have to kiss someone's ass just to be allowed to use the place. Do you think contacting the landlord would help? Maybe you guys should go to the City Council meeting and complain.

Sounds like the ACLU can probably give you advice. Do you guys have plans to set up shop at another location?

Keep fighting no matter what!

I live in long beach and you guys at the infoshop never did anything in Long Beach anyways, you did not have the support of the community and actually brought on more problems. but I think that you should let us here in Long Beach make up decisions for ourselves. Maybe you knew this and maybe you didn't but you all drew this type of attention to yourselves, I hope you find a new place to live.

Anita, I somewhat agree with you on the lack of community support received by the Infoshoppe. The space has been struggling with this since the day it opened, and insequently, was still struggling with this problem due to it's isolated enviornment and lack of community programs - however we were trying to change this. There were always changes in the collective who ran the shop. Collectives would constantly break up and new ones would form. There would always be a conflict of interest as of what people wanted to do with the space, not to mention other drama that played a roll in this as well. It wasn't until recently that the shop was beginning to become benefial to the community such as when we started a FREE Clothes Program, (a subsidary of RACUN ), which provided free shirts, pants, blankets, jackets, coats, shoes, etc. to the community. We were receiving clothes donations from people in the community almost every other day. We got so many clothes that we had to change the sign outside so it didn't say "donate your clothes" anymore, and instead just "come get free used clothes", and even then we were still getting lots of donations from people in the community. People in the community would come by and get free clothes, blankets, jackets, shoes or whatever they needed. The center was beginning to become directly involved in the needs of people in the community, in fact there were even a few regulares who came by often who relied on the program to get clothes. Such as one individual who was recently released from LA county in thin white sheet clothes in the middle of the cold night. He had a court date in a few days and was going to loose his job if the judge sent him back in. He had nothing. He came to the shop seeking help, he took a shower, got warm clothes, along with another outfit to wear when he went to court. He even had a meal at the shop. He went to court and was able to keep his job. He even donated money to us despite his current situation. There were other programs at the shop as well such as Food Not Bombs (which used to be more active)... Again it wasn't until recently that programs like these started developing at the shop.

I agree with you to some extent that there was lack of community support and benefit from the shop. Anyone can open up a space with books and liturature and call it "revolutionary" - but the fact is the majority of people in the community don't relate to half the material. However people in the community do have needs, and do want things to change. I think to run a productive center within the community it has to be directly involved in empowering that community, and not just with zines, pamphlets and books that no one has ever heard about, but with programs that play a direct and essential role in developing community control and self empowerment. This is what I think the shop lacked most. Which is one of the reasons why I started the Free Clothes Program.... Anyways, i'd like to ramble more but I got places to go, people to see and things to do...

just my 2 cents.

I think this shows the need for community activist groups to be prepared to video the cops at every interaction related to the center. If the cops had been videod on Dec. 28th, that could have been shown to Crestwave as evidence of the false nature of the March/April aggression.

The Police State increasingly encroaches on any attempt to exercise our constitutional rights. The agents of the same state create massacre and mayhem on the people of Iraq because the police state they had must be replaced by the police state we will make for them. You can rest assured that as time goes by fascism will only increase. Keep up the struggle. Lee

The store that housed Payless Shoes on Third Street downtown between the demolition of the old shopping mall and the erection of the new is now vacant. There are a number of other vacant stores in the same general vicinity due to the economic downturn over the past two years.

i live in long beach and saw how the infoshop brought some undue negative attention to themselves. i support what they were trying to do, however their methods were at times adversarial to a fault. rather than trying to build bridges in the community, the info shop felt it necessary to get caught up in the post 9-11 hysteria and fly inflammatory banners outside of the place. banners that say 'fuck the pigs', even if i agree with them, WILL attract negative attention from the police. so why did the infoshop continue to whine about police surveillance when they brought it down on themselves? had they conducted themselves as an "alternative" bookstore/infoshop without sucumbing to the hysterical rhetoric of the time, they would have been a lot less CONSPICUOUS TO THE COPS. and who knows, they may have had a fighting chance. alienating the public at large is not the first step at creating a popular social movement. and isn't a conscious, critical movement the precursor to any uprising of the working class?

the info shop didn't seem too concerned with making an intelligent and mature effort to win over the hearts and minds of the community at such a critical point. i went in there a few times, and got NO hellos or any acknowledgement from the people there, maybe because i wasn't a teenage, white, orange county black bloc poster boy, i don't know. it seemed that even when the place was full of people they were content with their little anarchy clubhouse as it was. why is that?

next, someone from the info shop going by the name of "rampage" gave a FRONT PAGE interview to the LB Press Telegram, which is by no means a left-leaning publication. they should have been aware of this in the first place, it's pretty obvious, but what were the aims of such an interview? come on, the LB PT wasn't going to give the infoshop any sort of dignified coverage or legitimacy, what were they thinking?
this individual gave the PT a huge opportunity to discredit anything positive that they were doing by painting the infoshop tenants as childish and unintelligent. with the inflammatory and immature tone of "rampage's" comments, it wasn't much work to do so. convincing others of a viewpoint that is seen as extremist to the general public takes a skilled orator. namely one who is going to provide a concise, effective outline of the basic ideas behind anarchism. adding to the self discrediting, the picture of "rampage" on the front of the paper was complete with a grafitti covered wall behind him, while he sat in the foreground smoking a cigarette (looking oh-so rebellious).

if the people who ran the infoshop had a little more insight of the communities they were trying to help, it might have been more of a success. there are lots of communities in the long beach area that would be receptive to the notion of a society suited to the needs of the majority, the working class. however, it seemed that they were content staying over on 7th & redondo, away from the communities where people are looking for an alternative. a prime example of this was a sign i noticed for SPANISH LESSONS. now who were they trying to help? shouldn't they be teaching english if they're making an attempt at community empowerment. NEWS FLASH: the people of belmont heights are perfectly comfortable in their SUVs and overpriced bungalow homes. FUCK 'EM. what the info shop needed to do was build support throughout the communities that are looking for a better way of life, and are willing to fight for it.

sorry folks, but you suburban OC transplants just didn't get it. instead you brought down heat on those of us who ride bikes and wear black clothes who ACTUALLY LIVE in low income neighborhoods because we have to, not because mommy and daddy happen to own some apartments there.

i'm sure people are going to respond with the typical, "well you should've gotten involved, maaaan". or " you weren't doing anything, duuuuude." but check this out, i don't want to work with people who lack a basic understanding of what we face as workers. if people who are organizing against globalisation and social change think the WTO and IMF are a bank (as one of your more active members thought), then i'd be wasting my time. why am i going to listen to suburban white kids who still live off mommy and daddy while they 'fuck the system' when i have to fend for myself and have lived with and through poverty and police opression? i've gotten along fine so far without your help, and i sure don't need it now. i'm sure others feel the same way. the infoshop is a prime example of an opportunity for progress squandered by egocentric 'activists'. i'd rather continue to educate myself and try to pass this information along to my fellow workers than to hop on the anarchy bandwagon because it's there. and lastly, i'm not an anarchist....i just think like one. that's my two cents. later.

Quote << The store that housed Payless Shoes on Third Street downtown between the demolition of the old shopping mall and the erection of the new is now vacant. There are a number of other vacant stores in the same general vicinity due to the economic downturn over the past two years. >>Unquote.

He said erection. He.,he,he.

What a shame.
Oh, well.
What's for dinner?

We're having meat tonight, honey.

YOU TED are a TYRANNT, go to hell.

don't dis these guys, not all of us are 15 y.o. punk rockers who think that thet anarchy is killing cops. get a fuckin life and some good books and learn your shit before you go preaching it.


very sorry to hear about the center, would be more then glad to help.

"not all of us are 15 y.o. punk rockers "

Then you have NO excuse and you're even more pathetic.

The shop was closed because they pissed everyone off. Hanging a banner that reads "Honk If You Hate Pigs" is no way to win over anyone but fellow rich kid assholes. LA Dudes explanation as to why the place was closed is half the way there. There is now way these children (led by a few pedophilic adults) would be able to get their "message" across any other way than they did. They acted like the violent Stalinists they claimed to be. NION is a Stalinist group and they led all the so-called PEACE protests. Stalin was as bad as Hitler. In 32-33 he starved 7-9 million Ukranians TO DEATH so he could grab their land. Bullshit that away all you want in the name of your bizarre revenge fantasies, but you anarachy fucks are as bad as Nazi Skinheads. It's like rapists asking what anyone could have against love. The infoshop couldn't last because it had no purpose in the first place.Rich white kid all.

"NION is a Stalinist group..."

Unsubstantiated Allegation.

You have a mighty big imagination. What rich white kid? Who are you talking about? Never met any wealthy anarcists. Lots of rich white ignorant god fearing blood sucking ass holes around though.

I never met a rich anarchist, a rich socialist or a rich communist. People who go out and waste time holding up protest signs and joining ridiculous campaigns to impeach a sitting President do not become successful. Rarely do you see a Mercedes, BMW or ANY luxury car festooned with "Impeach Bush" or "Stop the War" bumper stickers. In fact, I think that the use of political bumper stickers is strictly in the realm of the loony left.

God Bless America. Also, God bless the gate guards which keep those petulent little fuckwads away from my home and property.

Da tavarish, you try to hold it againts roving bands of drunken solders looking for
your silverware and women. Ha Ha. Dasvedonya.

I am not a rich white kid, and i lived at the REACH Center for over a year, until the day it closed down.

Its bad enough to have to use such services (fortunately, they exist for people like you). But its still WORSE if you did not use the opportunity afforded to you by virtue of you not having to work, to get a JOB and become self-sustaining. Hopefully, you are now in a better position to take care of yourself.

I am curious: what instruction or information, in the way of job preparation/living skills, were you provided? Did they just give you a fish instead of teaching you HOW to fish?

KOBE what are you talking about? are you refering to me or someone else?

Did you post this? "I am not a rich white kid, and i lived at the REACH Center for over a year, until the day it closed down."

If so, then my response was to you. Why would you have to live at the REACH center?

I lived at the REACH center because I wanted to organize within the community, connect with other people, and and hopefully carry out an established goal for social change. And I have a job for your information. The center was funded by those of us who lived there... but why do you even care in the first place??

I cant see why you have made the political choices that you have made at such a young age. I am enjoying our dialogue ove at KOBE Forums. This is just an extension of that.

If this is true then they really had it coming. Funny how idiots are so quick to blame someone else for stupid things they themselves have done. Typical Dehomocrats.

"i live in long beach and saw how the infoshop brought some undue negative attention to themselves. i support what they were trying to do, however their methods were at times adversarial to a fault. rather than trying to build bridges in the community, the info shop felt it necessary to get caught up in the post 9-11 hysteria and fly inflammatory banners outside of the place. banners that say 'fuck the pigs', " !!????

That's right, all of us conservatives are homophobes. We are scared of and hate anybody who's not a WASP.

If you hate Muslims and niggers as much as we do, visit our website.