http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_5038731,00.html

Campers to protest Columbus Day parade

AIM, others won't seek permits to pitch tents near Capitol

By Lou Kilzer, Rocky Mountain News
October 3, 2006

The American Indian Movement and other activist groups plan to camp at Denver's Civic Center without permits this weekend to protest Saturday's Columbus Day parade.
They say they don't need a permit from "an occupying power" to use their own land.

State and Denver police said Monday they see things otherwise.

If the protesters choose to occupy Veterans Park next to the Capitol as planned, State Patrol officers will remove them, said Department of Public Safety spokesman Lance Clem.

Denver police said they will enforce an 11 p.m. curfew for any nearby property that falls under their jurisdiction.

"We hope that there's not a confrontation," said Glenn Spagnuolo, a member of the Transform Columbus Day Alliance, one of the protest organizers. "We hope that our assurances to the police that we will not harm the parade marchers will (let) us have this camp."

But the group will not ask permission to set up camp, Spagnuolo said.

"Asking an illegal colonizer for permission to be on land that doesn't belong to them doesn't work for us," he said.

Denver's Columbus Day parade, first held a century ago, is the nation's oldest. In recent years, however, it has become a lightning rod for protesters who consider Columbus a genocidal conqueror.

What some see as a possible warm-up for this weekend's annual showdown between Italian Americans and Indian activists took place Monday at a news conference in north Denver called by parade organizers.

Three American Indian activists, who slipped in to watch the event, eventually were invited to join the discussion. Suddenly, though, the two sides began exchanging insults.

Pro-parade forces had brought in an American Indian, David Yeagley, of Oklahoma City, a classical-music composer with a Ph.D. in history, to explain why Columbus should not be considered a racist icon. But before the event was over, Yeagley, who identifies himself as a Comanche, called one of the activists a "commie."

Each side accused the other of racism.

But Spagnuolo assured parade organizer George Vendegnia that his group planned no violence during Saturday's parade.

"We've always said we were going to be nonviolent," he said. But he added, "I'm not saying it will be a lovefest," either.

Many of the organizers said they hoped protesters would give them a break this year. They insisted they have a right to their own celebration.

"Just don't stop my parade," Vendegnia said.

He said protesters have disrupted the parade in the past, and he pledged, "I ain't going to let that happen again."

The protesters plan to march from four directions and descend on Veterans Park at 6 p.m. Friday. Once there, they say, they intend to set up tents and stay overnight.

Spagnuolo said he has his fingers crossed that authorities will not overreact.

Still, he said, "We made a decision that we are no longer respecting the authority of the city of Denver. And we have requested permits from the original tribes."

Three tribes have given the protesters the right to camp in central Denver, he said.

If there are any protesters still there on Saturday, they will see the Columbus Day parade.

Staging for the parade will start at 7:30 a.m. along West 14th Avenue between Bannock and Elati streets.

The parade begins at 10 a.m. at Colfax Avenue and Court Place and ends at 14th Avenue and Broadway.

kilzerl@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2644