{"id":406545,"date":"2026-09-21T21:08:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T21:08:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/406545\/"},"modified":"2026-09-21T21:08:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T21:08:10","slug":"new-group-to-focus-on-grassroots-power","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/406545\/","title":{"rendered":"New group to focus on grassroots power"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/profile.php?id=61594113629880\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Red Manatees Southwest Florida<\/a> will hold its first community meeting on Wednesday, Sept. 23, at 6 p.m. in Meeting Room A in the South Building at the Fort Myers Regional Library in Fort Myers.<\/p>\n<p>A newly-formed grassroots organization, its mission is to spread progressive values and organize communities across the region. Previously operating as the Democratic Socialists of America\u2019s (SWFL DSA) Southwest Florida chapter, the group rebranded to reflect its independent, community-first approach to organizing.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re excited to bring people together around the issues that matter to real working class Southwest Florida,\u201d said Christopher Proia. \u201cThis is about building real, lasting community power \u2014 one neighbor at a time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Red Manatees will focus on volunteer mobilization, canvassing, and building support for candidates and causes aligned with progressive values, including Medicare for All, rejecting corporate PAC money in campaigns and other community priorities.<\/p>\n<p>Open to the public, the first meeting will cover future events and volunteer opportunities, networking among working-class residents of the region and the group\u2019s role in a broader national movement.<\/p>\n<p>Red Manatees Southwest Florida is dedicated to progressive advocacy, volunteer organizing and civic engagement across Southwest Florida.<\/p>\n<p>For more information, follow SWFL Red Manatees on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/profile.php?id=61594113629880\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Facebook<\/a> and other social media.<\/p>\n<p>The Fort Myers Regional Library is at 2450 First St., Fort Myers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Red Manatees Southwest Florida will hold its first community meeting on Wednesday, Sept. 23, at 6 p.m. in&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":406546,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[209,211,210],"class_list":["post-406545","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral-headlines","tag-cape-coral-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406545","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=406545"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406545\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/406546"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=406545"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=406545"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=406545"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}