Bob’s guest today is University of Pittsburgh English professor William Scott. Instead of conducting research in a library or writing another book, Scott spent his sabbatical camped out at Zuccoti Park in downtown Manhattan, headquarters of Occupy Wall Street. For six weeks, Scott explains to Bob, he worked as a librarian for the movement, helping to build and maintain a vast collection of books which became known as the “People’s Library.”
But in the early morning hours of November 15th 2011, an army of police in riot gear – acting on the authority of Mayor Michael Bloomberg – raided the park, seized thousands of donated books, and destroyed nearly all of them, along with just about everything else in the library – laptops, bookshelves, storage bens and cataloging supplies. Occupy Wall Street sued and under a settlement reached last month, the city will pay $366,700 for property damage caused during the raid. Here’s a copy of the settlement:
