Occupy Wall Street Has $40K in The Bank And 'The Money Is Going to Start Rolling in Now'

Ramin Talaie/Bloomberg | Getty Images

Demonstrators rally on Wall Street in lower Manhattan in New York, U.S., on Saturday, Sept. 17, 2011.

As you've surely noticed, the Occupy Wall Street Protestors have taken things to another level in the past couple of days.

Hundreds have been arrested. They have the power of unions behind them now, which has drawn thousands to protest with them and gotten the attention of big media outlets. And there are two separate movements growing within the protestors.

The youth behind the original movement are organized into factions or committees, including legal, medical, and finance, and they are pulling away from association with the union protest movement now. The people behind the original movement recognize that their strength is in their youth, and we found little evidence to confirm reports that they're not organized.

They now have $40,000 in the bank, in an account at Amalgamated Bank.

"At first, Victoria [Sobel, one of the movement's unofficial leaders] was sleeping with $10,000 in the park," says Darrell Prince, who works on the finance team. He and others on the team wear a gold "$" sign as an elbow patch to identify themselves.

"We've collected $40,000 from donations and buckets on the street," Prince says, and "the money is really going to start rolling in now."

So far, the money has come primarily from three buckets on the street, which collect donations from passersby and other supporters. Another source of income comes from online donations via the privately-registered site Occupywallst.org and nycga.cc, which is registered to a Brooklyn resident.

The finance team has established a credit union account to centralize the money at the Amalgamated Bank. Until the credit union account was established, it wasn't possible to accept big donations. Now they're ready to accept money from donors, who have already contacted the finance team about making larger-sized donations, they say.

Even with more money, it's not clear what they could accomplish yet. One concrete goal they might rally behind is the Buffett or Millionaire's Tax. Prince also suggested eliminating all tax deductibles.

As they raise money, the city pays hundreds of cops overtime to prevent them from getting close to Wall Street offices.

Last night, there were over a hundred cops (4 were on horses) blocking the protestors from entering Wall Street near Broadyway, close to the entrance of the NYSE. (We'll have pictures soon.) Some have batons, like the one you see a cop swinging at protestors last night in this video.

We spoke to a few cops on duty there. They told us a number of things we were startled to learn, like:

• Hundreds were arrested yesterday (we've only seen numbers from NY1 confirming that 28 were arrested)
  
• The protestors have started to get violent (the cops have too, as this video shows)
  
• The cops (the ones we spoke to) don't mind the protestors. They are enjoying the overtime, which they've been getting a lot of. When we spoke to them around 10 PM, all who spoke to us (about 5) had been there since 5 AM. Reactions to having been on duty for long hours over the past couple of weeks range from "I'm bored," to "I'm tired," to seeming to have a good time, to thankful. One gave us a high five as a thank-you for paying his overtime.

Curious what protesting is like for the protestors?

This story originally appeared on Business Insider

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