History : About the Ad-Hoc Organizing Committee

As you may know, numerous writers have been questioning the events of Sept. 11th since the day the tragedy occurred. Over the ensuing year and four months, a dialogue built up whereby researchers shared information, investigating various avenues of inquiry; and gradually, it became clear to some of us that we needed to have a more-formal, organized strategy - whereby we could present the vast scope and detail of the evidence in a format that was more accessible to the public.

Since June of 2002 especially, numerous meetings and press conferences have taken place around the country - toward the goal of full-disclosure and a citizens' commission. Since October, a small but committed group began holding weekly conference calls to outline exactly what may be involved.

We created a list-serv to further this, (which now has some thirty plus members).By December it became clear that we had done enough prepatory work to make ourselves known to the public.

Although our numbers are small at present, we are confident of our place within a large community of investigator's, activists, etc. - many of whom have expressed to us a desire for a thoroughly democratic "citizens' commission."  Through the individuals on this committee we maintain an active, respectful correspondence with many such dedicated people, and consider it only a matter of time before they recognize that we have laid the foundation for something that they will want to be involved in, (in various ways and proximities).

For the moment, there are a number a tasks which lie before us, requiring our attention, (if we are to give this initiative the solidity it needs), that others may find the ground upon which to get more actively involved.

What we have discussed so far may be briefly summarised as follows:

1) We plan to have a FOUNDING CONFERENCE in New York, sometime in March of 2003. By the close of this conference, we intend to have affirmed the overall framework of the "citizens' commission - outlining the date of its completion, procedural principles, how to make the process national in scope, and so on. As such, we will have a lot of work to do in preparing for that conference - democratically working through many of the relevant questions beforehand. 

2) To this end, we have also decided to have two organizational gatherings leading up to the FOUNDING CONFERENCE: one in Washington, on Sunday, Jan 19; and one in New York on the weekend of Feb. 8-9. (Since this process will be strongly internet-based, parallel meetings may also be held in San Francisco and other cities at or around the same time, with the findings uploaded to a common website). 

3) Much of our discussions thus far have centered around the establishment of various committees for taking care of relevant tasks. In brief, these are:

• Outreach, (largely what we have been doing over the months of Nov/Dec, preparing the INTRODUCTORY STATEMENT, press-release). This particular branch will eventually include a "PR-media" sub-committee.

• Evidentiary 
  - criteria 
  - research
  (This would include a sub-committee focused on developing an internet "9/11 database" which would serve to collate all the various streams of research into an organized whole).
  

• Organization (this concerns the overall framework of the project, containing a "logistics" sub-committee) 

• Resources (collating and making available as many written, audio/visual, musical resources as possible... to organizers and the general public... including a "how to kit" for starting local organizations, helping people hold meetings, etc)

• Government liason 

• Victim-families liason

• International liason 

• Fundraising

• Legal

Naturally, there is much work to be done. Some of the various names of these committees may be changed - their roles expanded - as we get a clearer idea of what tasks need to be done and who is prepared to follow through on them.

For a more in-depth look at the discussions which have taken place so far, Click here for the archive of minutes from the various meetings which have taken place over the last few months. 

The main focus then, of this list, is to help you identify where you think you may like to get involved. Once you've established that for yourself, then you will want to subscribe to separate lists specifically set up to discuss the work of the various committees in detail.

This list, therefore, is not for detailed discussions of news, the latest research, long-term vision, and so on; it is to help you get your initial questions asked, to bring you up to speed about where we are "at" along various fronts, that you may then take the next step.

As you can see, involvement at the level of the organizing committee is of a fairly serious nature. Although we welcome the involvement of people at every and all level of an ultimately grass-roots initiative, we are primarily looking for people here who are prepared to advance the organizational work of an umbrella group for a national movement. If it is that you prefer to work at a more local level, (and/or any points in between) we encourage you to let us know, that we can do what we can to support your work, establish links between our various activities, and advance our collaboration as we move forward.

If you are not sure where you would like to get involved, and would simply like to be kept informed about new developments, please send an e-mail to the following address, 9-11 Truth Alliance News .

Again, welcome. 

signed,the "ad hoc Organizing Committee"
of the 9/11 Truth Alliance
working towards a
National Citizens' Commission