The newest addition to 46dems.com

On Wednesday night, Kathryn and I finally set up what Betty has been asking for. We are now able to take donations and membership dues online!

Kathryn and Stan put a lot of work into a point by point comparison between 8 different options to accept online payments. They finally settled on Click and Pledge, after determining that the costs for their services were overall more reasonable for our purposes.

Raymond T. Cole Fund Committee

On April 16th, the 46th District Membership passed a motion creating the Raymond T. Cole Fund, and asking me as chair to appoint the members of the Raymond T. Cole Fund Committee in collaboration with the chair of the Finance Committee, Kathryn Lewis.

In selecting the members of this committee, Kathryn and I set 3 main goals. First, we needed members of the Executive Board to ensure a secure connection with the core leadership team of the district. Second, we wanted to identify people who had worked with Ray while he was Treasurer and an active member of our community in order to help ensure that his values and dreams are part of the discussion of criteria and selection of ideas and projects. Third, we wanted to encourage new people to be involved and bring forward ideas and energy that we might not otherwise see.

Given those goals, I have selected the following people to be members of the Raymond T. Cole Fund Committee:

* Javier Valdez
* Jan Ames
* Pat Emerson
* Stan Moffett
* Betty Means
* Jason Sawatzki
* Janet Miller
* Kathryn Lewis
* Mariah Voutilainen

Per the bylaws, I am also a defacto member of all committees, and I will be very engaged with the process of developing criteria and the selection of ideas. However, because I plan to bring a lot of ideas to the committee myself, I am going to leave most of the organizational work to the nine members so as to avoid undo influence on the process. Ray's primary personal focus was ethics, and I see my role as chair as one of establishing the foundation and supporting the work of others. I have every faith in the members of the committee.

This Committee, and the Fund itself, is a new road for us as an organization. We have the potential to have a huge impact in North Seattle, King County, and Washington State. The more we can extend our opportunities into the future, the better. There is no box.

Let's go change the world.

Notes from the Chair, April 2009

I am relatively new to politics in North Seattle. I only got involved in 2003, when I volunteered to help build our website. The 46th District Democrats has a long and proud history, most of which I honestly am not familiar with.

Part of that history, and a clear indication of the dedication of past members to our cause, revealed itself this past month when I received a notification letter from the Raymond T. Cole Trust. Ray was the Treasurer of the 46th for a number of years in the 1990’s.

We have been given a gift. It’s not huge, but it is substantial. I see it as an opportunity to build our organization, in order to fulfill our mission in ways that we have yet to imagine.

There is a story about a woman who gets a goldfish and a small fishbowl, and when she went to clean that bowl she put the goldfish in the bathtub. She cleaned the bowl and returned to find the goldfish swimming in a small fishbowl sized circle, not understanding that he had the whole bathtub to explore. That is where I see the Democratic Party, swimming our small circles inside imaginary walls. To explore our new horizon and find new opportunities, we need your help. Specifically, we need your ideas.

What are your “Big Ideas” on what a party organization could do? Some ideas that I’ve heard already are extra trainings for activists, both inside the district and around the county or state. We could help provide transportation to big events, like our state committee meetings, by renting a bus to pick up people from around the Seattle area who need to travel across the state. Or we could make some long term capital expenditures.

I do want to make some things clear. This gift does not replace the budget that we passed in March. We still need your membership, and we still need your participation. In fact, we need it now more than ever. More opportunities for activism means more opportunities for activists, and that means you.

It’s also important to mention that this gift was to the “46th District Democrats”. That’s not just me, and that’s not just the Executive Board. That means all of us. So, we need ideas from everyone, thinking outside the box about how we can best use this gift to accomplish our mission. I have posted a copy of Ray’s obituary on our website, and you can read more about him on page 4 of the April newsletter. The Executive Board will be discussing criteria for evaluating the ideas that come in.

What do you think? What can you imagine? Contact me.

Chad Lupkes
Chair, 46th District Democrats

Education in Seattle and Statewide

What is happening, if anything, this year to improve funding for public schools (will we remain 42nd in the nation?), and expanding "basic education" for our children???

What is the Seattle Public Schools' strategic plan, and how will it change curriculum, overcrowding in North Seattle, assignment plans?

Join us Thursday evening March 19th for a terrific panel featuring:

• Seattle School Board Members Sherry Carr and Board President, Michael DeBell;
• Lisa MacFarlane, President of the League of Education Voters and one of the top voices our statehas ever had for education (also a 46th District PCO);
• Seattle PTSA Board Member Ramona Hattendorf, who parents and education activists in Seattle know as the voice of the Seattle PTSA's newsletter and education updates, and state PTSA leader for funding and basic education.

Also - we hope to hear from County Executive Candidates Larry Phillips and Dow Constantine.

The full formal agenda is published on Page 2 of our March Demogram. In addition to the forum above, we will be considering one published resolution and our 2009 Operating Budget. PCO's and Members, please make an effort to attend!

March Notes from the Chair

The first month of our operations have been very exciting, with President Barack Obama’s Inauguration on January 20th, the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act passing in Congress to get our economy back on track, and some other changes closer to home.

Thank you to everyone who stepped up to help us elect our endorsed candidate, Sherril Huff, for King County Director of Elections on February 3rd! The 46th came out strongly for her, with 58.29% of our vote helping her to get a countywide total of 46.33% and over twice the number of votes of any other candidate. This position will be on the ballot again in 2011.

King County Executive Ron Sims was nominated for a HUD post in Washington, DC, and a cascade of changes resulted from that. Because of the Charter Amendment that passed last November making the county positions “non-partisan”, the King County Council is the body with authority to fill the post. Precinct Committee Officers no longer have a direct vote to select candidates, although that does NOT mean that we don’t have or shouldn’t use our voices to express our preference.

As WSDCC Chair Dwight Pelz said in a recent op-ed, we need a strong leader in King County who will provide a vision to help secure our foundations, and we can’t wait until the November elections to find that person. I agree with Dwight that the person selected to lead our county needs to be a Democrat, and I encourage everyone to contact our council members to voice your opinions and let them know that they still represent us.

There have been some internal changes here in our organization that I need to bring to your attention. Elizabeth Willmott stepped down from her position on the Executive Board on the Friday after our last meeting. She can’t say why yet, but I’m sure we won’t be disappointed in her reason.

This opens a vacancy on our executive board, and I have appointed Erica Minshull as our King County Female Rep. The bylaws require that an announcement be made at our next meeting, with an election to be held at the following meeting. If Erica is elected to the position, this will mean that an At-Large position will be elected at our May meeting. Elizabeth still wants to be involved, so she is staying on as our Outreach Committee chair for the time being.

Our March meeting is going to be focused on the issue of Education. It’s enrollment time for the Seattle School District, and we have a lot of people within our district and beyond focused on giving our kids the best education possible. We’ll hear from some of them on March 19th. Hope to see you there!

And finally, Welcome to Padraig Comron Finan, son of Jayron and Danny Finan!! He was born on Saturday, February 28th. Both Baby & Mom are healthy, and we’re looking forward to meeting Padraig someday soon!

Resolution for consideration at March meeting

Here's a resolution for publication in the next Demogram, for consideration at our March meeting. It's been cleared by our present Platform/resolutions committee.

Dean

Re-naming the West Seattle Bridge

WHEREAS the bridge across the Duwamish waterway, commonly known as the “West Seattle Bridge,” connecting West Seattle directly with SR 99 and with I-5 via Spokane Street, provides significant benefits to Seattle residents;

WHEREAS Jeanette Williams, while a member of the Seattle City Council, was the primary figure in procuring the funding necessary to build the bridge at a high level, rather than just above the waterway as its predecessor was configured before being irreparably damaged by a marine collision;

WHEREAS the bridge’s high level eliminates the need to raise and lower the bridge for marine traffic, making it the best solution for drivers and others;

WHEREAS no other person was as instrumental in seeing the high-level solution implemented; and

WHEREAS Mrs. Williams is now deceased, thereby meeting a criterion set forth by city ordinance;

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the West Seattle Bridge should be re-named the “Jeanette Williams Bridge,” for now and in perpetuity; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the 46th District Democrats petition the City Council and the Mayor of Seattle to initiate and pass the necessary ordinances to accomplish the re-naming of the bridge.

Submitted to the 46dems for consideration at their March 2009 meeting

Executive Board changes

Elizabeth Willmott stepped down from the King County Female Delegate position on Friday, citing an unforeseen personal obligation that will prevent her from serving a full term. She expressed her support for the Executive Board, saying via e-mail "I truly enjoyed my time on the 46th District leadership team and regret that new circumstances will keep me from continuing in this role." Elizabeth will be replaced as King County Female Delegate immediately but she expects to remain as Outreach Chair for the coming month.

For the February 24th KCDCC meeting, per the authority granted in our bylaws, I am appointing Erica Minshull as the King County Female Delegate. She will continue in that role until the vacancy is announced at our March 19th meeting and an election is held on April 16th. If she is elected as the Female Delegate, we will announce the At-Large vacancy at the April meeting for an election in May.

We all wish Elizabeth the best of luck in whatever is pulling her away from us!

Eboard working meeting, February 18, 2009

The Executive Board meeting met on Wednesday night just before our February General Membership meeting to discuss some things and make some decisions.

The Local Action Fair on Thursday is going to be great. We're getting a lot of positive feedback from the community, and we have confirmations from at least 17 groups so far.

Janet Miller brought forward a proposal to create an ad-hoc Elections Committee. This would be a group of people working to review and recommend changes to our Endorsement rules, establish and maintain an Elections Calendar, provide analysis of past campaigns and elections, and write articles for the Demogram based on their findings. Proposal for ad-hoc Elections Committee for the 46th LD, Passed. Chad appointed Janet to chair the new committee.

Sarajane made a motion to sponsor Rep. Jim McDermott's Potato Feed at the $100 level, Passed. Sarajane will make this motion to the full body tomorrow night.

After a discussion about online communications, Betty made a Motion to establish a Constant Contact Account and upload up to 2,500 for $30 per month, Passed. Chad will set up a free 60 day trial account over the weekend, and come to the body for approval of the ongoing expense before that trial period runs out.

The Top Two Primary lawsuit continues

Article by Natalie McClendon, Chair, Whatcom Democrats

Washington State’s political parties are expected to be back in court in March 2009 in the on-going court case over the state’s so-called Top-Two Primary election method. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last spring that the Top-Two Primary was constitutional “on it’s face,” and that the state should go ahead with implementing the primary system, and see if it is unconstitutional in practice. Now the U.S. District Court will determined if the primary method, in practice, is constitutional, by evaluating how Sec. of State Sam Reed conducted the election.

Todd Nichols, a practicing attorney and chair of the Rules Committee of the Washington State Democratic Party spoke to the quarterly meeting of the 40th Legislative District Democrats in February about the progress of the case. Nichols explained that in order for the Top-two Primary to be constitutional, as claimed by its proponents, it would have to be conducted completely without political parties, which is the reason the primary ballot used the unusual wording of “prefers Democratic Party” rather than straightforward statements of party affiliation. The court will be looking at whether under a purely non-partisan primary, the political parties can still exercise their constitutional rights to select their own party nominees, and that these nominees can be considered on the General election ballot.

The Democratic Party conducted “nominating conventions” in the spring of 2008 to select party nominees, to show the court that it’s desire to choose it’s own candidates was genuine. If the party had skipped this step, it would have undermined the party’s argument that their constitutional rights to choose their party’s nominee would be infringed by the Top-Two method.

In evaluating the constitutionality of the Top-Two Primary of 2008, U.S. District Court Judge John C. Coughenour could determine that the harm to the voters is too great and issue an injunction against use of the Top-Two, pending the final outcome of the court case, Nichols said. He predicted that the case could take up to four more years to resolve.

While party conventions have been used for centuries to choose nominees, partisan primary elections are more common in the U.S. today. Washington is the only state in the union that does not use a partisan primary method. Washington’s political parties support a partisan primary like the Open Primary, Private Choice, also known as the Montana Primary, that was used in Washington from 2004-2007. This method asks voters to choose one party’s ballot to vote for their preferred party nominee, and each party’s nominee advances to the General Election ballot.

Many editorial writers and Washington Secretary of State Sam Reed have claimed that a partisan primary, where voters chose a party ballot, is unpopular with the voters. However, the Washington State Presidential Primary election was conducted as a partisan primary in February 2008, with strong public support for it over a caucus process. If the state continues to use the Top-Two method for its regular primaries (in August), the parties will be forced to choose nominees in a caucus or convention process.

Nichols said the strongest legal argument against the Top-Two method is that in order to make the primary non-partisan, and therefore acceptable to the court, the Secretary of State ignored state law on the conduct of elections for political party’s Precinct Committee Officers. Reed ordered county election officials to declare as winners the top vote-getter, even though they did not meet the state law requirement (RCW 29A.80.051) that they receive at least 10% of the number of votes cast for the top vote-getter of the same party in that precinct. As a result, people whose names were written in and received one vote were declared winners. The reason for the 10% requirement is to ensure that PCOs of the political parties be at least nominally representative of the party voters in that precinct.

Another constitutional argument against the Top-Two method will be that candidates on the general election ballot in November 2008 were not the nominees of the parties, in some cases. This situation shows that a political party was denied the right to select their own nominee to be considered by the voters in the general election. The same argument applies to races where two candidates from the same party were the top two vote-getters and advanced to the general election ballot, which happen in a number of races for Legislature in 2008. Having a constitutional right to select your own party’s nominees becomes meaningless if that nominee cannot be considered by the voters on the general election ballot.

Plaintiffs in the lawsuit are the Democratic Party, the Republican Party, and the Libertarian Party. It's ironic that the one common ground the major political parties share is their desire to remain separate in the eyes of the voters.

January 15th Minutes and Action Item

At our General Membership Meeting on January 15th, we conducted our Biannual Reorganization, and passed a resolution. This resolution was submitted by Ruth Williams to our newsletter editor, Barbara Whitt in time for inclusion in the January Demogram, however because we printed the entire set of bylaws and the proposed endorsement rules necessary for the Reorganization, we could not include the resolution in the printed version. Ruth had also sent the resolution to the 46-democrats discussion list, and asked for discussion on that list and for a ruling from the Chair that the resolution was timely. I ruled that it was. The body put forward a motion to suspend the rules to allow us to hear the resolution, a 2/3rd requirement which passed overwhelmingly. You can read the details of the debate in our minutes.

Here is the text of the resolution:

Naming Thornton Creek Park Six
”Alice Bryant Peace Park on Thornton Creek”

Whereas Alice Franklin Bryant was a Seattle activist for peace, justice, and a healthy environment, who passed away in 1977; and

Whereas Ruth Williams, the long-time neighborhood park steward for Thornton Creek Park Six, is endeavoring to have said park named "Alice Bryant Peace Park at Thornton Creek"; and

Whereas naming a beautiful, urban, natural area after a person who devoted her life to creating a more peaceful, beautiful world is a very appropriate honor; and

Whereas honoring a peaceful person in a peaceful place directly across the street from a large and growing shopping center invites the public to come and take refuge from the pressures of daily life;

Therefore, Be It Resolved that we, the 46th District Democrats, endorse and support the effort to name Park Six: “Alice Bryant Peace Park on Thornton Creek”;

You can download a PDF version of this resolution on our website, and I am submitting a copy of the resolution to the appropriate members of the Seattle City Government today.

---

Chair's Note

I received a phone call from the chair of the Thornton Creek Alliance about this resolution on Friday, January 16th. She was disappointed that the body considered this resolution without hearing full presentations from all sides. I invited her to submit an article to the Demogram.

Consideration of resolutions like this is part of our responsibility as a community organization, and we have rules and procedures to help us and set the foundation for how we do this. But this does not end the discussion. The decision on what this park will be named is made by the Parks Department and the Seattle City Council. Comments on this resolution and the topic of naming parks are welcome here on this blog or via letters to the editor. The bottom line for me is whether we as an organization followed our procedures, and that we encouraged a discussion on the issues of the day.

What do you think?

Finance Committee

I was able to sit down with Kathryn Lewis tonight, and she is willing and excited to accept an appointment as Finance Committee Chair. We bounced a few ideas back and forth about the budget, the fund raising goals and ideas, and how this committee can coordinate and cooperate with the other committees to enhance our visibility in the community as an organization and build our membership base as part of the overall strategy.

We now have a full set of standing committee chairs!

Committee Appointments

The Bylaws of the 46th District Democrats define six standing committees and a few other ad-hoc committees. The committee chairs are appointed by the Chair. I have been in discussions with the Executive Board members, and I am making the following appointments:

• Program Committee: Gerry Pollet


• Legislative Action Committee: Sarajane Siegfriedt


• Membership Committee: Betty Means and Javier Valdez (co-chairs)


• Platform and Resolutions Committee: Dean Fournier


• Community Outreach Committee: Elizabeth Willmott

I would also like to appoint Dean Fournier as the chair of the Bylaws Review Committee, tasked with collecting ideas for changes to the bylaws and bringing a set of recommended changes to either the February or March meeting. I would also like to tap this committee to review the standing rules that we have that are appropriate to review during this election cycle so we can have them ready to go when needed.

Moving forward, I am still working to identify someone who can take on the Finance Committee for the next two years, and I am open to suggestions on who should be appointed to conduct the required Financial Review of our 2008 books. I would also like to task this committee with coming up with recommendations for opening the books of the district to our members. Not every exhaustive detail, but being able to see reports from the Finance Committee on the website would be valuable, and I would like to hear ideas on what those reports should contain and how they should be formatted. The members money needs to be well spent, and it is our responsibility to ensure that we are transparent to those who give us their hard earned dollars.

You can read more about the committees and see what reports have been submitted over the last few years on our website:

http://46dems.com/committees/index.php

Keep in touch!

Chad

Welcome from the Chair

Posted here.

Welcome to the website of the 46th District Democrats. We are a community organization and the grassroots arm of the Democratic Party in North Seattle.

"The purpose of the organization shall be to promote citizen participation in the Democratic Party, advance the 46th District Democrats’ platform, and support and work for the election of Democratic candidates and candidates for nonpartisan office who demonstrably espouse the principles contained in that platform." - Our Platform

Activism is the quest to answer three questions.

1. What decision is being made?
2. Who is making that decision?
3. How can I influence that decision?

Most often, political activism focuses our attention on legislation, executive decisions, and the elected members of our government that we can influence by our vote. Community activists recognize that this is only part of the picture. The decisions we make as individuals, like whether to pay our mortgage or our medical bills, are just as important as a decision made by an elected official whether to lower interest rates or pass Health Care Reform. And our ability to influence decisions can be focused in both directions, as we try to influence the larger community toward social and economic justice.

I've heard it said that Democracy stands on two feet. One is political, the other is economic. If the members of our community do not have a solid and secure economic foundation, they will be too distracted by their lives to be able to get involved or even pay close attention to the decisions made by elected officials. In order for the Democratic Party to be able to say that we support "Democracy", we need to be as focused on the day to day decisions of the members of our community as we are focused on the day to day actions in City Hall, the County Council, Olympia or Washington D.C.

I encourage everyone to get involved in their community. Our membership provides our organization with the resources that we need to conduct our operations. Our resolutions and platform are the basis for how we communicate with our elected officials and how we allocate our resources to influence their decisions. We use tools both online and off to get in touch with our neighbors, build and strengthen our community, and maximize the positive influence we can have. We invite you to join us, teach and learn from us, and be empowered to become the change that you wish to see in the world.

- Chad Lupkes
Chair, 46th District Democrats

2009 Reorganization Results

Hi everyone,

I thought I would relaunch this blog by posting the results of the 2009 Reorganization meeting.

Chair - Chad Lupkes
1st Vice Chair - Shanna Sawatzki
2nd Vice Chair, Membership - Betty Means
2nd Vice Chair, Programs - Gerry Pollet
Treasurer - Stan Moffett
Secretary - Stan Sorscher
State Committee Man - John Webber
State Committee Woman - Janet Miller
King County Male Rep - Dean Fournier
King County Male Alt - Matthew McSheehy
King County Female Rep - Elizabeth Willmott
King County Female Alt - Sarajane Siegfriedt
Sgt at Arms - Barbara Whitt
At large - Kathryn Lewis
At large - Erica Minshull
At large - Javier Valdez
At large - J. Peter Shapiro
At large - Jason Sawatzki

The district considered an endorsement for the Director of Election position, and gave a strong endorsement to Sherril Huff. We passed a motion to give $500 to her campaign, and to provide up to $1,000 in printing costs to help GOTV for her campaign in the 46th.

We also passed a resolution (being prepared for posting).

More to come, but I wanted to get this out there.

Ken Jacobsen is now online!

Ok, I've established hosting for kenjacobsen.com. He's already out doorbelling, and I'll be working on getting a list of accomplishments done for that site and for Rep. McIntire. Still need to establish the hosting for phyllisgkenney.com, but that's next.

Suggestions are welcome! Just let me know either on this blog or by email.

Welcome!

Welcome to my "About the 46th District Democrats" Blog! This is an unofficial blog about what I see going on in my district, and my impressions on how Democrats and Progressives can take the next step into the future of our political environment.

Please feel free to post comments!

46dems Health Care

The 46th District Democrats are working on more than just getting Democrats elected to office. Our members care deeply about the issues that affect our lives. Some of these issues are national in scope, like Foreign Policy, and some are state, county or local. All of them deserve our attention, but with our limited resources, we can't work on everything.

On February 17th the 46th LD had an Issues Summit. We worked for about 40 minutes, and came up with talking points for each of the planks from our 2004 platform? How many people here were at that meeting, and remember the talking points for the group that you were working with?

The question after that meeting was who should take charge of these talking points and turn them into action items that get follow through? All of the 18 members of the Executive Board are busy doing the work of the district. We can't do everything ourselves. There was some discussion at our meetings about how to move forward, but to be honest it got drowned out by the work that we are doing preparing for the nomination convention, working on the update to the bylaws that we did last month, working on a list of community connections around North Seattle, and everything else that we as individuals do on a daily basis.

A few weeks ago, I got an email from Charles Heaney, the chair of the King County Medical Association. It was a resolution to the district to form a committee to work on Health Care. I responded back to him that we shouldn't need a resolution to do what we want to do anyway.

Notes from the Chair - October 2004

The Good Fight

The main reason for all of our hard work this past year has been to defeat Bush, put Senator John Kerry in The White House and take back our country! The campaign began back in February when nearly 7,000 Democrats attended 224 separate precinct caucus meetings throughout the 46th legislative district. Then on May 1st, in an incredible demonstration of the strength of our local grassroots, over 1,100 Democrats attended our legislative district caucus at Ingraham High School. These events were followed by the King County Convention, WA State Convention and the Democratic National Convention in Boston. What a year!

The bond that unites us as a Party is the steadfast belief in our core values: healthy families, strong communities, equality of opportunity, social justice, a clean environment and much more. These are the values that direct the policies in our Platform and it is by our guaranteed right under the First Amendment of the Constitution that we may assemble and speak out to promote the candidates that stand for these values. We have exercised these rights all year long in our monthly meetings and when doorbelling. Now is the time for us to embrace these wonderful rights and do everything we can to get the word out about our Democratic candidates! Now is the time for each of us to make a commitment to Take Back Our Country for future generations!

A Call to Action

We have accomplished much as a district organization in 2004 and everyone can be proud of their efforts thus far, but none of that matters if we aren’t victorious in the General Election on November 2nd. We need your help in these final weeks to elect Senator John Kerry as the next President of the United States, to re-elect Patty Murray as our senior US Senator, to elect Christine Gregoire as our state’s Governor, and ensure victory for Democrats throughout Washington State!

What can you do? If you are a PCO, then we need you to pick up your bundles of campaign literature (including your 46th District Democrats Sample Ballots) and deliver them to the voters in your precinct. If you are interested in being a volunteer, then we can put you to work canvassing precincts in the 46th, working on the Democrats Coordinated Campaign or connect you with the Democratic campaign of your choice. Are you willing to work to ensure that our platform moves forward? Are you willing to stand up and let your voice be heard? Are you willing to fight for your values? Please attend the meeting on October 14th and learn more about how you can help in the final weeks before the election. Victory depends on YOU!

Peace, Scott