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RNC protesters try new tack to get permit
St. Paul city officials say they can't grant a permit until six months before next year's Republican National Convention, but protest organizers think they've found a loophole.
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The continuing bureaucratic dance between St. Paul city officials and people who want to protest at next year's Republican National Convention took a new turn Thursday.
Protest organizers, frustrated by their inability to obtain a permit for a potentially massive march on the Xcel Center next Sept. 1, believe they've found a loophole in city law that will win them the permit within the next few weeks.
"It's a back-door way for us to get a permit," said protest organizer Meredith Aby. "We need the city to realize that September 1, 2008, won't be just another demonstration, so we want to get the permit sooner."
Protest organizers have bristled against city officials' position that a city ordinance does not allow them to grant a permit for public assemblies until six months before the planned event.
But attorneys who examined the ordinance discovered a provision that allows events "held on a regular or recurring basis" to be permitted within 60 days for the first planned event.
To that end, the organizers filed an application with the Police Department on Thursday, asking for a permit for a Jan. 1 protest at the convention site, which would then recur every other month until the convention.
"There's a lot they need to do to get this event planned and without the permit, they don't know where they're going to march or when they're going to march," said Teresa Nelson, an attorney for the Minnesota American Civil Liberties Union, which, among several law firms, has offered to provide legal representation to the protesters.
"If they don't get a permit, there could be legal recourse, but our concern is they would get a permit too late for a judge to rule," she said.
Repeatedly, at recent Democratic and Republican national conventions, planned protests collided with security concerns of local police and the Secret Service and the disputes have often ended up in court.
Aby said organizers don't plan to immediately take the city to court, but will wait to see if the permit application is approved. "We want to have the discussion about this sooner rather than later," she said.
After the organizers filed their permit application at the Police Department's north-end station, a handful of protesters staged a sidewalk demonstration against the Iraq war.
St. Paul police spokesman Pete Crum said he wasn't familiar with the specifics of the city's ordinance on permitting demonstrations. "I'm going to have to research it," he said.
The route of the planned Sept. 1 demonstration starts at the State Capitol and makes its way through downtown St. Paul to the Xcel Center, where the convention is to open that day.
Organizers hope to attract thousands of demonstrators from across the nation, setting their highest estimated turnout at 100,000.
During the 2004 Republican convention in New York City, the streets of Manhattan were flooded with protesters, estimated by police as more than 100,000 and by organizers as upwards of 400,000. Police arrested 1,800 of them.
Bob von Sternberg • 612-673-7184
Bob Von Sternberg • vonste@startribune.com
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