Protestors Plan to "Occupy Port Jeff"

On Saturday, protesters plan to occupy a corner of Port Jefferson to support those in the ongoing Occupy Wall Street movement. Juan Gallardo, an activist who is , put together the Meetup to Occupy Port Jefferson on the corner of Main Street and Broadway.

“I–as I believe most Americans are–am concerned and outraged at the economic situation,” he said when asked why he joined the Occupy Together movement, as it’s called on the website.

Although he said he didn’t see himself as having to “get involved.”

“We are all involved,” he said. “The movement represents the frustrations of us all. Most particularly the young, our children and grandchildren.”

The Occupy Port Jefferson rally is in solidarity to the Occupy Wall Street movement, which Gallardo says is “active and participatory Democracy at work.”

He said he shares the anger and frustration of the protesters in a lack of jobs, enormous debt, foreclosures, falling income as health care costs are on the rise and college fees also ever increasing.

“There’s no help to students and families,” he said. “The increasing inequality in society has shocked us.”

So far, the Meetup website is the only place that Gallardo has promoted the rally but he and some others were at the same place last Saturday. Many people thanked them for their stand and suggested they repeat the protest the following weekend.

He hopes the movement will bring the voice and concerns of the people to move the government to create jobs, make education affordable and help financially strapped families. He also says protesters want Congress to preserve Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

“We have to reconstruct America,” he said.

Gallardo has a specific idea on how to do it too.

“Dollars being spent in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan must be brought home to build America, rather than destroy far away lands,” he said. ‘Let's bring all the troops home, to make a better future for us and our children.”