Update (7:20 pm): Eleven Occupy D.C. protesters have been brought out of the building by police and placed in vans, and at least one van with six people in it has left the scene. Some protesters are being carried out of the building with their legs and feet cuffed. There are about 100 protesters still inside, and police are telling reporters they’ll be charged with unlawful entry.

An Occupy D.C. protester reportedly threw himself in front of one of the vans trying to leave the scene, but some protesters accused cops of trying to hit the man on purpose.

Update (6:40 pm): DCist editor Martin Austermuhle is on the scene and reports that there are six police vans at the Franklin School. The Washington Post’s Tim Craig adds that there are about 40 police cars on 13th street. Chants of “DC, take a stand, stop selling public land,” have died away, and the scene is quiet as Occupy D.C. demonstrators and supporters outside wait for the protesters to be brought out by police. It’s unclear how long those inside the building planned to stay there. The group Free Franklin is protesting the lack of housing for homeless people. You can watch a livestream here.

Original Post: This afternoon the Franklin School located at 13th and K Streets NW was occupied by a group of protesters affiliated with Occupy DC. The school, which was built in 1869 and served as a homeless shelter until it was closed in 2008, is unoccupied as the city debates what to do with it.

In a blog posting, protesters explained the reasons behind the occupation:

The closure of Franklin Shelter was not an isolated incident; it is part of a wave of austerity measures and structural adjustment policies that are mirrored all over the U.S. and globally, the policies of capitalism pushed by the 1%. Structural adjustment locally and nationally has removed land, plants, buildings, and other community resources from the hands of the people into corporate control. The U.S. government spends trillions of dollars to perpetuate imperialist wars and occupations overseas, and to unjustly imprison millions of people, criminalizing the activities of immigrants and people of color, in a ballooning prison system. Then, the federal and local governments push austerity measures that most impact poor and working class people by slashing funding for basic services for our communities. The crisis of homelessness in DC is part of a larger crisis of affordable housing, with years of rampant gentrification displacing low-income people of color from their homes and from the city, and the foreclosure crisis caused by un-checked banks who continue to rake in record profits while more and more families lose their homes.

Our government has failed to address this crisis, so we are taking action to do it ourselves.

We’ve heard that between six and eight protesters are inside, but we’re waiting to confirm that number. An email to organizers yielded the following response: “It’s a committed group of DC organizers and activists inside and they’re inside until the building is under community control.”

The protesters have called for a public meeting on the future of the building on Monday, November 21 at 6:30 p.m. at Asbury United Methodist Church (11th and K St NW).