Naked City

Anti-abortion activist Chris Danze

Photo By John Anderson

• Naked City

  Headlines and happenings from Austin and beyond

  BY MIKE CLARK-MADISON

• Naked City

  The high court rules – solidly – against Texas in death-penalty case

  BY JORDAN SMITH

• Naked City

  The Eastside charter school begins its bankruptcy proceedings

  BY RACHEL PROCTOR MAY

• Naked City

  Nobody voted for it, but insta-teacher certification is now the law

  BY MICHAEL KING

• Naked City

  Design standards sought to upgrade Austin's chain-retail sprawl

  BY AMY SMITH

• Naked City

  APD and the sheriff take different approaches to comply with state law

  BY JORDAN SMITH

• Naked City

  An angry rant by a redistricting disenfranchisee

  BY LEE NICHOLS

• Naked City

  Austin leaders pledge to defend local businesses from anti-abortion boycott

  BY AMY SMITH

• Naked City

  John Kerry rolls over John Edwards for the Democratic presidential nomination

  BY MICHAEL KING

A cross section of Austin business and community leaders have declared war on Chris Danze and his "economic terrorism" attempts to thwart the construction of a Planned Parenthood clinic in South Austin. The group gathered Tuesday morning at Güero's to plot a strategy over breakfast tacos with Planned Parenthood's national president, Gloria Feldt. The idea is to mobilize the business community behind the Planned Parenthood project and to take a unified stand against Danze's harassment tactics.

Four months ago, Danze temporarily halted work on the new facility by waging a boycott against the concrete suppliers and other construction companies associated with the project. Anti-abortion forces resorted to harassing phone calls, e-mails, and pictures of bloody fetuses mailed to participating businesses. The tactics drove off a number of subcontractors and ultimately the general contractor, Browning Construction Co. of San Antonio.

Construction has since resumed on the Ben White Boulevard project, and so has Danze's boycott effort. But this time, Danze has moved beyond harassing contractors; he has taken his bloody-fetus campaign to the corporate customers of some of these contractors, said Glenda Parks, chief executive officer of Planned Parenthood of Austin. Danze's connection to the construction community comes by way of his own concrete supply business, Maldonado & Danze Inc. In an interview with the Chronicle in November, Danze called Planned Parenthood "the single most violent organization in this nation. ... They are more violent than the Crips, the Bloods, and all the Mafioso crime families put together."

Lobbyist and former Mayor Bruce Todd, who led Tuesday's discussion, stopped short of thanking Danze for helping to strengthen the community's resolve to fight extremist efforts. "There are people who are speaking out much more loudly now," Todd said, with such commitment that one could almost forgive him for the line that followed: "Bring it on."