BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — For the second day in a row, people are camping outside the Bridgeport Police Department.
FOX61 spoke with protesters Saturday who said they will be out until Monday for the city’s council meeting, but now that it’s been postponed, they say that they will be out here for as long as it takes.
Los Fidel, one of the protesters, said, “So now they are staying until further notice. If it’s going to take a week, a month whatever it’s going to take they are here.”
Sitting around speakers, community organizers say they will wait to make sure their voices will be heard, but not before educating and uplifting each other.
“They’re discussing what it is that we’re fighting for exactly, they are discussing police reform, they’re discussing some laws that need to be changed and also discussing language that is detrimental to our trying to do,” said Los Fidel.
Protestors say it’s the language that comes in many forms whether it be about community policing, racial profiling, or defunding the police.
A term widely used in protests across the nation but in Bridgeport, organizers say they want to tear police departments down and start anew.
One protester we spoke to says in order to make a change, its best to listen to everyone.
Thalia Perez said, “You got to put yourself in their shoes like how they are hurting.”
Thalia Perez says she is supporting the black lives matter movement in Bridgeport because she knows how it feels to lose a loved one to the police.
Perez said, “Jason was a close friend of mine, so that really brought attention to my eyes also because I have friends and family that are in the black community, and honestly, I’ve been angry for the past two weeks because everything going on. It hits me hard I was going to come out show my support show my face. “
Organizers say as they continue to camp out, everyone supporting the movement has their own role to play.
“You don’t have to come to the police department and camp out, that’s not what we’re saying for the community to do that we have people that maybe not working at the moment and they’re going to do that, but we also need black male teachers, we need you to know things of that nature to fill up every single roll and in the systematic oppression,” said Grits.
Going forward protestors say that anyone who has questions about the black lives matter movement in Bridgeport to just simply listen with an open heart and an open mind.