Plans for local George Floyd protest gain momentum

Plans for protests at the legislature condemning the death of George Floyd in U.S. police custody are forging ahead, despite concerns by some Edmonton activists about how local police may be involved.

Nearly 2,000 people indicated on Facebook they plan to attend or are interested in Friday evening ’s Equality for All protest as of late Wednesday while a Facebook group with the same name as the group organizing the event had reached more than 8,600 members. An Instagram account associated with a Black Lives Matter group in Edmonton also indicated Wednesday it would be attending.

Organizer Tiera Williams told Postmedia Tuesday she had invited Edmonton police to attend, a move Shades of Colour, which advocates for LGBTQ people of colour, disagreed with in a statement posted to Instagram Wednesday.

“It’s counterproductive and detrimental to liberation work to be inviting or even speaking to police about what your intentions are, especially for an anti-police demonstration,” the statement said. “Inviting police into black or BIPOC spaces to ‘protect’ the people and their communities that their institution is actively murdering ... that’s not community care, it’s performative and a breach of trust.”

Williams said Tuesday that how city police would be involved has not been decided.

Edmonton police spokeswoman Cheryl Voordenhout said Tuesday the department and Alberta Sheriffs were working to support organizers “to uphold their rights and helping them to hold a safe protest within the context of public health orders.”

Floyd, a 46-year-old African-american man, was killed after a now-fired Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck during an arrest. On Wednesday, charges against Chauvin were elevated to second-degree murder, and charges were levelled at three other officers involved in the arrest.