{news} approved minutes from the 12-30-08 SCC meeting of the CTGP

[B Barry]

Approved minutes of the 7PM 12-30-08 SCC CTGP meeting: quorum met. 

Location: Portland Senior Center, 7 Waverly Avenue, Portland, CT  06480

Attendees per chapter: Fairfield: Paul Bassler and Richard Duffee; Greater
Hartford: co-chairpersons:

Steve Fournier and S. Michael DeRosa; Treasurer: Christopher Reilly;
Secretary: Barbara Barry; New Haven:

Patricia Kane and Jerry Martin; New London: Ronna Stuller; Tolland: Tim
McKee= facilitator. 

 

A.  Preliminaries:

1.  Introductions of voting/non-voting attendees; chapters; quorum was met;
no timekeeper; ground rules.

2. Approval of tonight’s proposed agenda; deletion=# C 8 due to time
restraint; two additions: report from Steve Fournier; listserv money.

3.  Review and approval of minutes of the 11-11-08 SCC meeting.

4.  Review and acceptance of the 12-16-08 EC meeting minutes.

5.  Treasurer’s report from Christopher Reilly: balance through today:
$1583.

 

B.    Proposal: The 12-30-08 SCC attendees agreed by consensus (5 for; 1
against and 1 abstention) to made the below changes underlined in black
italics. They were deemed not to be substantive changes so they would not
need to return to chapters for approval.

1.  The following proposal by Fairfield Chapters was approved, without
changes, by consensus to be sent to Chapters for feedback at the 11-11-08
SCC. Consensus to the 11-11-08 SCC meeting proposed by Jerry Martin.:

 PROPOSAL from Fairfield County chapter 

CONTACT:  David Bedell, 12 Ardsley Rd, Stamford, CT 06906, 203-581-3193,
dbedellgreen(at)hotmail.com                SUBJECT: Definition of party
membership. 

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: At its February 2008 meeting, the Fairfield chapter
adopted a somewhat stricter definition of membership than that in the state
bylaws. New Haven has also adopted a stricter definition. The purpose of
this proposal is to make party membership contingent on a simple written
declaration, just like membership in the major parties, instead of the
current definition, which includes vague criteria such as what constitutes a
volunteer activity or what is a "coalition partner." This proposal also
addresses the contingency of losing minor party status, which happened in
some towns during 2004-2006. Further comments can be read at HYPERLINK
"http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldCountyGreens/message/839"http://grou
ps.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldCountyGreens/message/839

PROPOSAL: In the CT Green Party bylaws (HYPERLINK
"http://www.ctgreens.org/bylaws.shtml"http://www.ctgreens.org/bylaws.shtml
), the section under "Individual Membership" shall be revised to read:

If the Green Party has minor party status in a town, then: A person enrolled
on their town voter list as a Green Party member is a member of the Green
Party for all purposes.

If the Green Party does not have minor party status in a town, then a person
may become a member of the Green Party under the following conditions:

1. The person must be an unaffiliated voter and must not have been
registered with any other party affiliation during the past ninety (90)
days.

2. The person shall fill out and sign a CT Voter Registration Form declaring
enrollment in the Green Party and submit this to an officer of the local or
state Green Party.

3. Upon submission of such declaration, the person's membership in the Green
Party will be effective after ten business days.

A person not yet old enough to vote under state law may become a member of
the Green Party under the following conditions:

1. The person will turn 18 and be eligible to vote before the next General
Election Day.

2. The person has applied to vote by filling out and signing a Voter
Registration Form with declaration of enrollment in the Green Party and
submitted this to their town hall or to an officer of the local or state
Green Party.

3. If the voter registration form is submitted to a local or state Green
Party officer, membership in the Green Party will be effective after ten
business days.

Party members shall receive announcements of State Party general meetings,
and shall be entitled to vote when attending State Party general meetings.
CTGP town committees may disallow members after questioning or vetting. 

 

DELETE: When an active Member of a Chapter, the member shall be entitled to
vote at all general meetings of the Chapter. No member, however, shall be
entitled to vote in more than one Chapter. Chapters may institute their own
requirements for membership different from those for State Party membership.

 

Not approved by consensus, proposal from Barbara Barry and S. Michael
DeRosa: member definition must include that people agree with Green Party’s
10 Key Values.

 

C. Reports:

1. (10 minutes): GPUS Presidential Candidate: Cynthia McKinney: write-in
issues at polling places; Secretary of State apparently has not counted
write-in votes from at least the following cities/towns: New Haven,
Manchester, Wethersfield.  Steve Fournier, co-chairperson of CTGP, wrote to
the Secretary of State and to the state chapter of the League of Women
Voters about this situation.

SF: I wrote to Michael Kozik, Esquire of the Elections Office of the
Secretary of State. His response to my 12-6-08 letter was that the various
statues covering the stated concerns expired on 11-7-08, 11-12-08 and
11-18-08. Steve noted that the Secretary of State, Susan Bysiewicz has a
right to request a review of any regulations. But she did not after Steve’s
letter. Nor did she respond to Tim McKee’s earlier letter to her which fell
within one of the statutory periods. Consensus: write-in candidates should
be encouraged; better write-in instructions should be provided to the voters
and to poll monitors e.g.: a) poll monitors should be better educated that
they are allowed to provide to voters upon request, the names of write-in
candidates; b) pens with thinner marking need to be provided to voters so
the markings are not so thick and be larger than the provided write-in
bubble; c) perhaps voters could be allowed to use stickers to apply to the
write-in bubble; d) and independent audit of the Secretary of States audit
of the 11-4-08 election was that it was a sham. Reason: very narrow
selection of which candidates at a limited number of polling places would be
audited. That is not all votes for all candidates would be audited at 5% of
the polling places. In one polling place, the error rate was 50% for one
candidate. e) these recommendations will be presented by CTGP
representatives to the legislative election committee on 1-10-09, sometime
between 10am and noon. CTGP members especially 11-4-08 CTGP candidates are
invited to join the following people who have agreed to meet with the
elections committee: Steve Fournier, S. Michael DeRosa and Tim McKee. 

Tim McKee is to scan the letter from Michael Kozik, Esq. for the CTGP
website.  Currently for a write-in candidate to be counted: a) the candidate
must notify the election office that they are a “serious” candidate; b) the
voter must write-in the candidates name within the provided box and c) the
voter must fill the additional bubble which indicates this is a write in
vote d) currently, provisional votes are not counted by registrars of voters
or the secretary of state..

 

2. GPUS reports from: CTGP representatives: Tim McKee: will advise the GPUS
website that Steve Fournier is a GPUS representative from CT. Tim will also
send emails to CTGP GPUS representatives, that they need to provide monthly
reports to CTGP SCC either in person or via email.  National Committee
Members: neither Steve Fournier nor Richard Duffee had anything to report.
S. Michael DeRosa of the GPUS Ballot Access Committee:

a) the litigation subcommittee of the GPUS Ballot Access Committee is
currently reviewing ballot access rules and regulations especially in the
states of past problems. The litigation subcommittee consists of the
co-chairpersons of the Green Parties of New Jersey and Pennsylvania and CT
(S. Michael DeRosa). b) goal of the litigation subcommittee: to have every
state involved in ballot access litigation. c) we need transparency
regarding the incoming and outgoing monies in the GPUS treasury. We
currently have a GPUS debt of $34,000 mostly due to the Chicago Presidential
Convention, about $2000 for national ballot access and other expenditures. A
recent proposal in support of transparency, failed because it did not garner
2/3 support from the GPUS National Committee.

Question: Are GPUS committee members on committees for life?  Answer: that
is left to the individual members if they want to stay for life or members
may be withdrawn by state chapters.  Question: Who pays for the travel
expenses of committee members e.g. international committee members?  Answer:
People who are on the international committee tend to be people who have the
willingness and time to travel and the willingness to pay for their own
travel expenses. Typically, the GPUS does not provide any reimbursement to
the international committee members.  Question: Will the GPUS in the future,
be more willing to provide some money for GPUS travel?  Answer: No known
plan to do so due to limited funds. 

Absent: Cliff Thornton, co-chairperson of GPUS and Charlie Pillsbury, CTGP
representative to GPUS.

 


3. CTGP literature:  Consensus: agreed to allow $50 for SMD to print
literature and it will be provided to website.  The following will
independently print literature for their chapters: Jerry Martin of New Haven
and Ronna Stuller of New London (100 copies). 

 

4.  Fundraising for CTGP: EC proposes that a fundraising dinner be held on
Sunday, 1-18-09 at a Hartford location.  Dinner theme will be our response
to continuing the work for human and civil rights in 2009 which was a
primary concern of the late Rev. Martin Luther King.  Other activities at
this dinner: trivia quiz and door prizes.

 

5.  Chapter mailing list and state mailing list: a) SMD: each congressional
district is encouraged to contact each registrar of voters in their district
for the list of registered Green Party voters. b) RS: the CTGP should
consider acquiring, yearly, the state-wide list of registered Green Party
voters. c) CR: CTGP should consider not using the old lists of CTGP members.

 

6.  ACLU lawsuit update. SMD: a) The ACLU wants to meet with myself and the
11-4-08 CTGP candidates on 1-10-08. b) the judge has determined that the
provision about the lobbyists and their immediate family members is
constitutional. c) the State of CT continues to advise the judge that they
are compiling campaign finance information from the 11-4-08 election; d) the
State of CT had indicated that they believe candidates will give campaign
money back to the State of CT. e) the State of CT has about 20 lawyers
working on this lawsuit inclusive of the Brennan Center for Justice.

 

7. CTGP potential goals for 2009:  development of CTGP Legislative Agenda
for 2009; e.g. Fight the Hike and repeal of real ID; universal health care;
election reforms; hearing meetings to go to; information about meetings;

concerns about the 20-30% tuition increase at state universities and
colleges.

 

8. deferred due to time: Website:  Steve Fournier, co-chairperson, to update
and maintain database on website inclusive of information which prior
candidates needed to provide organizations during campaigns; candidate
position papers.

 

9. Green Party of CT Road Show. First Road Show to be in Willimantic,
Wednesday at 7pm on 1-28-09: Speakers: Jean deSmet, 1st selectperson of
Willimantic and G. Scott Deshefy. Voter Registration forms may be provided.
All are encouraged to attend.  Other Road Shows will follow at other site
throughout the state.

 

10.  Chapter reports: 

 

11.  Any additions a) consensus: $50 is to be sent to the Portland Senior
Center due to their generosity in allowing the CTGP to use their facility;
b) consensus: $50 for continued use of the listserv c) place and date of the
CTGP Annual Meeting: to be determined. 

 

12.  1-27-09, Tuesday SCC meeting at Portland Senior Center.  Date, place
and time of 1-09 EC meeting to be determined.

 

 

Green Party Key Values: non-violence, respect for diversity, grassroots
democracy, social justice and equal opportunity, ecological wisdom,
decentralization, community-based economics and economic justice, future
focus and sustainability, personal and global responsibility, feminism and 

 

 


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