Pat Dollard

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Bloomberg – Occupy Wall Street demonstrators, whose chants against corporate greed resounded in Lower Manhattan, stormed across the Brooklyn Bridge, six weeks after mass arrests there thrust them into the national spotlight.

Crowds that appeared to number in the thousands took part in the day’s events, which began with unsuccessful attempts to disrupt the New York Stock Exchange. Through the day, about 300 arrests were made, police spokesman Paul Browne said by e-mail. Seven officers and 10 protesters were injured, Commissioner Raymond Kelly said in a late afternoon briefing.

“Most protesters have, in all fairness, acted responsibly,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg, founder and majority owner of Bloomberg News parent Bloomberg LP, said at Bellevue Hospital after he visited an injured police officer. “It is not an overwhelming number. The police were able to handle it.”

The bridge marchers, greeted by honking cars and cheering people, were accompanied by police in contrast to a rally Oct. 1, when more than 700 demonstrators were arrested. “Please stay on the sidewalk and thank you for your cooperation,” one officer said to marchers through loudspeakers.

The Occupy Wall Street protests, which began in New York, have spread to cities on four continents, including London, Sydney, Toronto, Rome and Tokyo. The demonstrators refer to themselves as “the 99 percent,” a reference to Nobel Prize- winning economist Joseph Stiglitz’s study showing the richest 1 percent control 40 percent of U.S. wealth.
Stock Exchange

The day began with about 1,000 protesters marching through the Financial District to the stock exchange from Zuccotti Park, where protesters first set up camp Sept. 17. Metal barricades blocked streets and police asked office workers to show identification. The stock market opened on time. Subway service proceeded without a hitch, transit officials said.

Participants later headed north to Union Square, where they joined students who complained of high-interest college loans. Police on foot and on motorcycles attempted to keep the streets clear. Shoppers in Manhattan’s SoHo neighborhood stared from store windows and snapped pictures.

“It’s a huge waste of taxpayer money to pay all these police overtime for two months,” Ken Polcari, a floor trader and managing director at ICAP Corporates, said by telephone from the exchange, where he’s worked for 28 years. “The Big Board isn’t going to succumb to a bunch of kids with no message.”

At one point, police wrestled with protesters outside 60 Wall St., the U.S. headquarters of Deutsche Bank AG (DB), as workers waiting to get through filmed the action with smart phones. One protester’s sign read: “Debt — the only thing still made in the U.S.”
Police Overtime

The city has spent about $6 million in connection with the protests, Kelly said. That doesn’t count the Nov. 15 ouster of the demonstrators at Zuccotti Park and today’s deployment of thousands of officers, many of whom were getting overtime pay.

Howard Wolfson, Bloomberg’s deputy for government relations, said at a City Hall briefing yesterday that forces would be deployed to deal with tens of thousands of people “aimed at significant disruption.”

“I’m definitely eager to show the world and the city that we still care about the occupation,” Mark Greif, 36, who teaches English at the New School, said as he gathered with others at Zuccotti Park today. “I’m hoping people will see the commitment of American citizens to having something done about Wall Street excesses.”