A trailblazing housing organizer and her diverse working class neighbors fight Robert Moses, the real estate industry and five mayors to create the first Community Land Trust in New York City - an oasis of permanently low-income housing in the heart of the rapidly gentrifying Lower East Side.
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About
In 1959 New York City announced a “slum clearance plan” by Robert Moses that would displace 2,400 working class and immigrant families, and dozens of businesses, from the Cooper Square section of Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Guided by the belief that urban renewal should benefit - not displace - residents, a working mother named Frances Goldin and her neighbors formed the Cooper Square Committee (CSC) and launched a campaign to save the neighborhood. Over five decades they fought politicians, developers, white flight, government abandonment, blight, violence, arson, drugs, and gentrification - cyclical forces that have destroyed so many working class neighborhoods across the US. Through tenacious organizing and hundreds of community meetings, they not only held their ground but also developed a vision of community control. Fifty three years later, they established the state’s first community land trust - a diverse, permanently affordable neighborhood in the heart of the “real estate capital of the world.”
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Educational use
We provide DVDs and streaming rights to educators, community groups, government agencies, public libraries, museums and businesses - from a 14 day rental to a life of file streaming option.
Screenings
Upcoming Screenings
11/8 | 9:00pm | Urban Eye Film Festival | Cinema Elvire Popescu, Bucharest, Romania
Past Screenings
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October 12th, 2024 | Architecture Film Festival Rotterdam, Netherlands
Sebtember 25th, 2024 | Architecture and Design Film Festival, NYC
April 13th, 2024 | Museum of the City of New York, NYC
March 7-10, 2024 | Budapest Architecture Film Festival, Hungary
March 1-8, 2024 | Santiago Alvarez Memoriam Documentary Festival, Cuba
February 17, 2024 | The People’s Forum, NYC -
Nov 12, Community Room 8A NYC | Nov 3, Pratt Institute Brooklyn NY | Oct 29, Workers United Film Festival NYC | Oct 28, Boston University MA | Oct 12, Mary McLeod Bethune Life Center Jersey City NJ | Sep 8, Jerry H. Labowitz Theatre for the Performing Arts NYC | Sep 30, 59 E 4th St. NYC | Jun 4, Community Room 8A NYC | May 31, Hall University Settlement NYC | May 25, 59 E 4th St. NYC | May 18, Barrow Mansion, Jersey City NJ | May 11, Hunter College NY | Apr 20, Planners Network NYC Special Hour | Apr 16 & Mar 24-26, Firehouse Cinema NYC
Press
Reviews
Journal of the American Planning Association - a review of Rabble Rousers by Ezra Haber Glenn, MIT
Educational Media Review Online City - a review of Rabble Rousers by Kimberly Poppiti
Video Librarian - a review of Rabble Rousers by Sue-Ellen Beauregard
Progressive City - “It took us 50 Fucking Years”: a review of Rabble Rousers by Samuel Stein
Journalism Hunter College - “Department Chair Kelly Anderson and Alum Ryan Joseph release new film Rabble Rousers: Frances Goldin and the Fight for Cooper Square“ by Etta Feuer
InterviewS
The Laura Flanders Show: April, 9 2023
Filmmakers
Kathryn Barnier (Producer, Director, Editor) • Ryan Joseph (Producer, Director) • Kelly Anderson (Producer, Director)