Despite a permit expiration date set for the end of April, members of Occupy Madison have no plans of relocating their protests from their current site on East Washington Avenue.
According to Mayor Paul Soglin’s spokesperson Katie Crawley, there is no chance for a renewal of the protesting permit allowing Occupy Madison to reside at its current location, and the city will not be accommodating requests for additional space.
Crawley also said the property the organization currently resides on will be needed for storage, so it is not possible for them to stay any longer than April.
Ald. Bridget Maniaci, District 2, said Occupy Madison is free to organize however they choose, but the city does not want camps to be permanently set up on public property. The city’s goal is to redevelop those properties in a timely fashion, she added.
Maniaci also said she does not expect trouble to arise from the removal of Occupy Madison because the city has been working collaboratively with them for several months and there has always been the expectation that the organization will have to leave in April.
According to Occupy Madison member Stephen Kafganski, the organization does not currently have any plans to move to another location. The members of the movement might stay at their current site after the deadline passes because there is nowhere else for them to go, he added.
“Moving takes a lot of energy,” Kafganski said. “There was a pretty strong feeling that this was gonna be the last move back in October, and I don’t think there’s a lot of sympathy for finding a different site.”
Maniaci said the organization will be fined if they do not clean up their site in April, and they are expected to leave the lot in a better condition than they found it.
According to Maniaci, there is not a pressing demand from the neighborhood to remove the organization, but she said they have had a negative impact on the block and its community.
“There are some people in the neighborhood that have been unhappy, but I think it’s hard to determine if the people they’re unhappy with are at Occupy Madison or at the Porchlight Shelter across the street,” Crawley said.
Crawley said the city has gotten calls from citizens both against and in support of Occupy Madison.
Members of the organization have known the deadline for the property for a while, but the day-to-day management of providing things like heat and getting people together comfortably has been more of an immediate concern than finding somewhere to relocate, Kafganski said. Despite the lack of future plans to move, he said the organization will most likely continue to exist after the deadline.
Occupy Madison does not have a single mission, but wants everyone to have his or her voice heard, according to Kafganski. It has been a challenge for the organization to get as many diverse voices as possible and to continue to stay together, he added.
Kafganski said the organization hopes the city will be more aggressive with helping individual problems, including homelessness, after experiencing the movement.
