From the News Journal:
Members of Occupy Delaware reached Friday said they hadn’t decided whether to accept the state’s offer to occupy the portion of Brandywine Park near the rose garden. That’s a mile from the more centrally located H. Fletcher Brown Park, where the group requested to stay. The state Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control, which oversees Fletcher Brown and Brandywine, also agreed to waive the $75 per day park fee and the $500,000 insurance requirement.
“My understanding right now is that we will meet tomorrow in Fletcher Park and decide there about Brandywine Park,” Dan Halprin, a member of Occupy Delaware’s media committee, said on Friday. Because the movement has no official leader, it takes action when members gather and vote.
The fight over Fletcher Brown Park is a loser with the public. It is a PR disaster waiting to happen, one that will certainly lead to the crib death my colleague Liberalgeek spoke about a couple weeks ago here. The movement will not garner sympathy for its First Amendment rights nor its grievances by picking a fight with daycare children who use the park during the week. In fact, it is the perfect distraction for opponents of Occupy Delaware to use to make the movement fail.
Listen, the fight for visibility and centrality was lost when the Rodney Square permit was denied. There is no other centrally located park in the business district with the visibility of Rodney Square. Once the city denied that permit, it did not matter if the Occupation occurred at the Riverfront, Fletcher Brown or Brandywine. Because the later three all have one thing in common: they are not Rodney Square.
So please, good folks at Occupy DE, avoid a public relations disaster that will cripple the movement and camp at Brandywine.
Just my two cents.