Two Million Too Many National Vigil Day

Thoughts from Kevin Zeese, President of Common Sense for Drug Policy and advisor to The November Coalition

Friends:
Bravo to Nora, Tom, November Coalition volunteers, board members and vigil leaders. You all did a fantastic job on February 15th. It is eye-popping to see the extraordinary work you are doing. I am proud to be associated with each of you.

Forty-three VIGILizing cities! Over 30 states! Thousands of people involved nationally, and this is just the beginning. Imagine where we can be next year by building now on this success.

Our efforts to put a public face on opposition to the drug war's reliance on prisons as a method of drug control will be a key deciding factor in ending our government's insane and destructive drug strategy. The fact that people are willing to stand in public and protest a policy that results in 25% of the world's incarcerated population confined in the USA-land of the free-is a bold public statement.

In order to have the most desirable impact, this success needs to be followed by expansion of the vigil project. We need to be consistently out there - on the street - expanding the number of vigils and increasing the numbers of people involved in each vigil.

As my colleague Robert Field says, "We need to go from strength to strength".

Vigils at 43 sites provide an incredible opportunity to learn from our successes, frustrations and failures. This is the time to share experience among ourselves in order to take full advantage of the lessons to be drawn from February 15th- what worked, what didn't?

What drew the media to your vigil? How did the small vigils handle being small, and how small is acceptable? What strategies were most effective at getting people out? What events around the vigil were most effective and least effective-press conferences, forums, parties? Was being part of a national day of vigils important-should we strive for more national vigil days? How long does it take to get a vigil organized?

Please feel encouraged and welcome to share these questions with your family, friends and colleagues in order to get their input.

I know there are other issues that should be discussed which some of you discovered while organizing or participating in a vigil. Now is the time to share our successes and frustrations so we can build this into a national movement that can't be ignored!

Congratulations, once again, to everyone who worked on the Two Million Too Many National Vigil.


2 MILLION IS TOO MANY!
National Vigil Project - February 15 Vigils were a huge success. Below are links to each city's photos and reports

Alaska - Fairbanks
Dae Miles daemiles@mosquitonet.com

Arizona - Phoenix
Marcella Perrine marcella@november.org

California - Los Angeles
Aminah Muhammad aminah@november.org

California - Chico
Sharon & Craig North snorth11@dcsi.net

California - Sacramento
Sacramento FACTS JLafr28236@aol.com

California - San Francisco
Patty Lynn Neilson patty@november.org

California - San Luis Obispo
J0-D and Tom Dunbar dunbar@thegrid.net

California - Santa Cruz
Zoe Sodja zoe@cats.ucsc.edu

California - Stockton
Debra Cannistraci no1angel@jps.net

Colorado - Colorado Springs
Norman Abeyta HEMPCO@aol.com

Connecticut - New Haven
Elaine Sabatino elaine@november.org

Florida - Gainesville
Kay Lee KLee@vitel.tzo.com

Illinois - Chicago
Susan Bobby susan@november.org

Illinois - Normal
Further info posted at www.normalssdp.org - info@normalssdp.org

Kentucky - Eddyville
Paula Willett mosespa@apex.net

Massachusetts - Cambridge
Colombia Vive colombiavive@mindspring.com
Kim Hanna HANNAK028@aol.com

Massachusetts - North Hampton
Carolyn Hyppolite, , ckhyppol@mtholyoke.edu

Missouri - St. Louis
Contact Jeff at: Aimhigh6@aol.com

Minnesota - St. Paul
Jolene Mason jolene@november.org

Nevada - Las Vegas
Debbie Dedmon dedmon@november.org

Nevada - Winnemucca
Don Rogers rogers@desertlinc.com

New Mexico - Santa Fe
Bruce Bush gchervin@email.msn.com

New York - Albany
Randy Credico CredicoR@aol.com

New York - New York City
Mary Sibley mary@november.org
Kiovanna Rodriguez kiovanna@november.org

North Carolina - Asheville
Debbie Duncan debbie@november.org

North Carolina - Charlotte
Carrie Graves ncfamm@aol.com

Ohio - Cleveland
Kelly Haber-Ali kelly@november.org

Oregon - Portland
Sandee Burbank sburbank@OregonVOS.net

South Dakota - Pierre
Bob Newland newland@rapidcity.com

Tennessee - Memphis
Laney Kehel laney@november.org

Tennessee - Nashville
Kay Lee kaylee1@charter.net

Texas - Austin
Sebastian Williams sebastian@november.org

Texas - Dallas
Bob Ramsey rmz@flash.net

Texas - El Paso
Deitra Lied deitra@november.org

Texas - Houston
G. Alan Robison galan@prodigy.net

Utah - Salt Lake City
Scott Fife mumia_utah@lyris.lib.utah.edu

Utah - Salt Lake City
Mary Ann Johnston pin-btw@juno

Washington - Olympia
Dominic Holden dominic@november.org

Washington - Seattle
Vivian McPeak -viv@november.org

Washington - Spokane
Tom Murlowski - tom@november.org

Washington, DC
William Perry bill@november.org

Washington, DC - Free Hip-Hop concert!
Missy Shapiro
Brian Gralnick

Wisconsin - Madison
Claude Tower

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