Kristen Christian: L.A. Gallery Owner Behind Bank Transfer Day Talks About Her Inspiration to Take Her Cash to a Credit Union
She says it has nothing to do with Occupy L.A. and its Occupy Wall Street sister movement. Class warfare? Meh.
Courtesy Kristen Christian
Yet the timing of L.A. gallery owner Kristen Christian's idea couldn't have been better for those fed up with corporate banks that took billions in taxpayer bailout money in 2008 and are now find that it's okay to ream the American people with exorbitant debit card and account fees.
Christian's brainchild, posted to 500 of her friends on Facebook, was quite simple:
If you don't want to pay the likes of Bank of America $5 a month to access your money via debit card, just transfer your cash to your friendly, local credit union.
"I was tired of paying for fees for inadequate services," the 27-year-old founder of Le Spec Gallery near Koreatown tells the Weekly. "I found it disgusting that a large and wealthy corporation would target the working class, especially after the bailout money."
Simple enough.
But Bank Transfer Day has become a call to action for the Occupy nation. Christian told her friends to go ahead and make that move on Nov. 5. (And they told two friends, and they told two friends, and so on, and so on).
Now she has a Facebook page specifically for Bank Transfer Day and 28,000 supporters nationwide.
"The event turned into a movement," she says "It's a peaceful boycott of corporate banking started by one citizen."
And, addressing mostly rightblogger conspiracy theorists who think billionaire lefties are paying protesters to fuel the fires of the Occupy movement, Christian says, "We're not receiving donations from anyone" and that "this event is not associated with the Occupy movement or the group anony in any way."
By the way, the credit union she chose in defiance of Wall Street banks?
Coast Hills Credit Union based out of her hometown of in Lompoc, which is near her hometown of Arroyo Grande.
[@dennisjromero/djromero@laweekly.com]
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