Mass. Nurses Participate in National Day of Action on Sept. 1, 2011 to Protect Main Street

Call for Tax on Wall Street to Heal America

CANTON, Mass., Aug. 30, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- More than 60 events all over the nation will urge legislators to support the tax on Wall Street for jobs, health care and education on Main Street.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20060525/NETH016LOGO)

Two Events Planned for Massachusetts:

Worcester – Press Conference to Launch Campaign for Legislative Support for Tax on Wall Street
Outside Worcester City Hall, 455 Main St., Worcester MA
Sept. 1, 11:30 a.m. – 12 noon
Speakers  include MNA Leaders, nurses from Central and Western Mass, Worcester Mayor Joseph O'Brien, Jon Weissman from Western Mass Jobs With Justice and Olivia Stewart from Neighbor to Neighbor.

Boston – Demonstration Outside Offices of Senator Scott Brown Featuring Town Crier
On Sidewalk Outside Office of Senator Scott Brown, 240 JFK Building, 15 Sudbury St., Boston
Sept. 1, 12 – 12:30 p.m.
Participants will include local nurses, and community and labor activist, including a Town Crier in period costume detailing the impact of the actions of Wall Street on millions of working people who are suffering on Main St.

Massachusetts nurses, joined by other citizens and activists who are fed up with the ongoing economic crisis, will hold two events on Sept. 1, as part of a National Day of Action aimed at holding Wall Street accountable for the nation's ongoing financial crisis. 

Massachusetts Nurses Association/RNs will join nurses from Maine to California in holding more than 60 events in 21 states as part of National Nurses United's Main Street Contract for America Campaign. The nurses' top priority will be getting legislators to pledge their support for a new, national tax on the type of Wall Street financial activities that led to the 2008 economic collapse.  

Events, from soup kitchens to help feed the hungry and homeless, to community speak outs and street theater are planned from major urban centers like Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, and Orlando, to smaller cities and towns, such as Corpus Christi, TX, Marquette, MI, Bakersfield, CA, Dayton, OH, and Worcester, MA. National Nurses United is sponsoring the actions.

As part of this campaign, nurses will be visiting and calling the home offices of Republicans and Democrats alike, with a common message. Everyday Americans are hurting, and they need jobs, healthcare, housing, quality education, nutrition, and a secure retirement, not more cuts, as has been the obsession of Congress. See a preliminary list of actions at http://www.nationalnursesunited.org/pages/sept-1-event-list.

A tax on Wall Street trading of stocks, bonds, derivatives, currencies, credit default swaps, and futures – the very financial speculative activity linked to the 2008 financial meltdown and resultant recession – could raise hundreds of billions of dollars to pay for the programs that "are desperately needed to reduce the pain and suffering felt by so many families who feel abandoned in communities across this nation," says NNU Co-President Karen Higgins, RN, who works at Boston Medical Center.  

Contact:  For interviews with participants in the Mass. events, or for more information about the Main Street Campaign, call David Schildmeier at 781-249-0430 or visit http://www.MainStreetContract.org.

SOURCE Massachusetts Nurses Association