PORT TOWNSEND— About 40 brightly clad members of an Occupy Port Townsend group conducted a peaceful yet somewhat boisterous demonstration at the Jefferson County Courthouse on Friday morning.
Its purpose was to protest the foreclosure process and was timed to coincide with the weekly property default auction.
“All across Washington every Friday at 10 a.m., hundreds of homes are foreclosed where they have an auction and the only person who places a bid is the bank,” said one of the group’s spokespeople, who identified himself as “Neutron.”
“We are gathering on the front steps to call attention to the foreclosure problem and how the housing crisis is affecting all of us, specifically in Jefferson County,”
A handout by the group said the net result of the weekly property auctions is that millions of people are losing their homes to lenders and being evicted during the worst housing crisis since the Great Depression, and 14 million homes are now foreclosed or at serious risk.
In Jefferson County, 100 homes were foreclosed in 2011, reflecting an increase from 10 foreclosures in 2006, said county Treasurer Judi Morris.
The demonstrators put on a “street theater” presentation until the arrival of Mary Fahey of the Peninsula Process Service in Sequim, which conducts the auctions each week.
Fahey began reading information about the auctioned property to a handful of protesters, but the rest of the group soon filed in and filled the courthouse’s first-floor landing.
‘Freaked out’
“I was pretty freaked out,” Fahey said later.
“I’ve never seen anything like this, and I’ve been doing this job for the last 10 years.
“Usually there are only a few people here or I’m just talking to a wall, so I need to bring a witness to prove that I read the notices.”
Auctions on the first two properties discussed by Fahey were postponed, but the third, located at 230 Puget Loop, a home that was valued on the tax rolls at $164,865, was the subject of a bid by one of the protesters, James H. Ward.
Ward entered a bid of $1,000 and had brought a certified check to back up his bid.
Ward’s bid was not accepted, since it did not exceed the lone other bid submitted by the lender of $152,150 — which was accepted.
While Ward and Fahey moved away to discuss his bid, County Administrator Philip Morley asked the demonstrators to respect a corridor on the landing and the staircases to allow visitors and staff access to the area.
Fahey left the landing to make a phone call, at which point Neutron led a call-and-response in which he said phrases that were then repeated by the crowd.
During this, he implored the group to be “as loud as possible.”
“One family just lost its house to the 1 percent and corporate corruption,” he said.
“This family has been given 20 days to leave, and they will be evicted in the middle of winter.
“Occupy would like to know what our government is doing to solve this crisis.”
During the demonstration, several staff members walked out into the hall out of curiosity.
Heard in court
The sound carried upstairs to the Superior Court, where Kitsap County Superior Court Judge Anna Laurie was hearing a criminal case.
Prosecutor Miriam Norman said many in the courtroom “didn’t know what was going on” but that the judge made no comment about the noise.
District Court was not in session.
Neutron, who said he is a farmer and lives outside Port Townsend, said this is the first such action by Occupy Port Townsend.
A second event is planned Feb. 2.
“We are hoping to raise awareness and gain momentum for future Occupy actions,” he said.
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Jefferson County Reporter Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at charlie.bermant@peninsuladailynews.com.
