Minutes of SCC Meeting Of 8/30/05: quorum reached; approved
Middletown Public Library, Hubbard Room
Middletown, CT
7PM-8:30PM
Facilitator: Tim McKee (Tolland chapter)
Attending per sign-in sheet: Mike DeRosa (Greater Hartford), Barbara Barry (Greater Hartford); Justine McCabe (Western); Judy Herkimer (Northwest), Kim Herkimer (Northwest); Tim McKee (Tolland); Paul Bassler (Fairfield); Miguel Nieves (New Britain); Chris Nelson (New London); Aaron Gustafson (Hamden), Kelly McCarthy (Hamden), Quorum reached.
Preliminaries: 1. Ground Rules accepted.
1. Additional items to agenda:
Mike DeRosa adds item to agenda about need for letter to be sent to Sec. of State for each new candidate.
Justine McCabe GPAX addition (candidate) to DC anti-war rally.
1. Approval of last 3 months of minutes: 5-31-05, 6-26-05 & 7-26-05. Approved since they were all non-quorum meetings. Marked as unofficial but approved minutes for non-quorum meetings by consensus.
1. Treasurer’s report (Judy Herkimer): Monthly contributions continue throught credit card donations. John Amarillo’s campaign gave money that they did not spend back to the state PAC. Toll free number for GPCT rings at Tom Sevigny’s house and he is keeping a log for that number. Reimbursement was given to Chris Reilly for past expenses. Monthly charge for credit card processing is $35. Chapter balances/other information was circulated by Tresurer at meeting. Aaron : Does money have to come back to State PAC? Judy: “That money has to go somewhere, so it needs to go back to state PAC”. Barbara/Aaron/Kelly: it does not have to go, only, to the State PAC. It can go to any charity or non-profit organization. Judy: When passing the hat for donations, any $15 or more in cash: must have the person’s full name and address.
Reports:
1. Chapter Reports:
Greater Hartford: Have had progressive movie nights. We have shown the Nuclear Cafi, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, and 9/11 In Plane Site. We are opening up an Info Center (Lending Library) at the Greater Hartford Green Party Office that will be staffed on a daily basis by young people from Hartford. We are also running David Ionno for a place on the Hartford School Board.
Western: We are continuing to research tabling items for our proposal. We are working on the Bill C. Davis campaign (Congress) and Tom Sevigny campaign (Finance committee in Canton).
Northwest: We were invited back to the New Milford Fair that gave us a hard time last year. We also supported the Green Dialogue. We also got some media coverage in the local papers.
Hamden: We had our Launch Party for Kelly McCarthy’s run for Town Council recently. We got a lot of press and we have decided to endorse the Mayor, who is opposed by many of his own Democrats. If he loses the primary we would probably put him on the Green Party line for the general election.
Fairfield: David Bedell is running for Constable; Derek Spiro is running for Mayor in Stamford, Trish Dyane is running for board of ED. We had a petition campaign to get our candidates on the ballot. We had some trouble collection signatures at a summer arts festival. They tried to stop us from collecting signatures after they closed off the streets. It is still public property. They asked us to leave but we refused. They called the police and we told them that we thought we had the right to collect signatures there. They finally backed down and we continued to collected signatures.
New London: We have three candidates. Two for city council and one for Board of Ed. Raised $2000 so far. Increased interest on the part of the Republicans to cross endorse our candidates. But we decided not to do it. The cable access show has been going on for about a year now.
New Britain: We are running Miguel Nieves for Mayor of New Britain. Sept 8th Miguel will have his first debate on senior issues. In October, he will have his 2nd debate about child development. And there will be a third debate also. Miguel has had two home fund raising parties.
Non-agenda:
Judy Herkimer said that “at the last EC Meeting we discussed taping of the meetings.” Judy said that “Barbara and Mike agreed not to tape” until such time that we decide what to do with the tapes. She objected to the taping of the meeting for the purpose of notes for the Secretary’s use. Mike DeRosa disputed that he or Barbara had agreed to stop taping and Mike said “and it is on the tape” (of the EC meeting) that we had not agreed to stop taping our meeting . Mike said “if you want a copy of the tape of the EC meeting you can check it out”. Barbara also agreed with this assessment of what happened at the EC meeting. Kelly McCarthy said she could not recall that taking place but does remember that Judy was to do a proposal. Judy asked if Michael would do the proposal. Michael advised that since this was a concern that Judy brought forward then he advised he was willing to review any proposal brought forth. Kelly: It has pretty much been established from long ago that we could tape. Justine McCabe, the facilitator at the EC meeting, had a recollection that Judy was correct in her assertion. Mike said “that he is open to any proposal for the storage of tapes, and the recording is purely a question of accurate notes being provided to you by the Secretary. None of these tapes is given out to anybody, I don’t understand what the problem is”. Mike said that the discussion we are having “is precisely why we need to tape meetings”. Barbara added that taping of meetings for the Secretary’s use was authorized through the passage of proposal in August 2003. Aaron said he “would be fine remanding these tapes to the Media Center/Library that is being created at the Greater Hartford Green Party office.” Barbara said that at the last EC meeting, a proposal about this matter was discussed about the prior meeting tapes, where is our donated tape recorder, and other related issues. But a proposal has not been forthcoming. Barbara said: We need to respect our established process which allows for accuracy and respect for diversity of opinions.
The facilitator said after this discussion “that I am in a difficult position because this discussion is not on the agenda”. He asked if no one had any objections if we could move on. By consensus it was agreed to move to the next item on the agenda.
2. Green Party of United States report by Tim McKee, GPCT representative: National Meeting in Tulsa, OK: some people were elected but there remained an open seat i.e. should Tom Sevigny, of CT be elected to that open national co-chair position? This has not yet been resolved. There are supposed to be 6 co-chairs for the party. Michael: need better communication to/from state and national levels. We need to know what proposals are being proposed in the name of GPCT to the national. Mike is getting e-mails about what is being presented in GPCT name to the national party, and these people are asking for his feedback as a co-chair of GPCT. Mike said: “ I do not know what to say since I have no knowledge of these proposals ,and do not have an opinion one way or the other”. Can these proposals be put on the listserv or something? Tim: can do that on a weekly basis, especially proposals. Judy: most of National Listservs, you can join: one is for voting and one is for discussion or media listserv. Mike: it will be good for informational purposes to put things on listserv but if a proposal is done by our reps in their name or in GPCT, we as the GPCT need to be aware of it. Kelly: e.g. Tom presented a proposal in our name without anyone, e.g. officers, being aware of it. Judy: we need to hear from him (Tom Sevigny). The decision he made, I cannot imagine anyone in the state not completely agreeing with him. Because it completely benefited the CT Green Party and it’s members.
1. Women’s Caucus report by Justine McCabe: met 2 Saturdays ago. Had Judy Woodgreen from National Women’s visiting and spoke about what is happening on the national level. Worked on modified consensus to do a training. Looking for trainers to do training just after the election (11-05). Mike: are you looking to train new people or old (i.e. experienced) people? Justine: only have a couple of people trained. We need a kind of official trainers to train people. So any Green Party person is where we will start. Mike: we have a couple of people in Hartford who are eager to start, so keep us in mind. Barbara: which modified consensus will be used? There are various modified consensus processes out there, not just in the Green Party. But there is little or no written information about any of them. Justin: Lynn Serpe is a good trainer. There are 2 or 3 people whom Lynn mentioned might be good. Justine: will follow the modified concensus,the one that has been passed out here at the Green Party .
1. V.O.T.E.R. report by Michael DeRosa: voter verified paper trail (bill) has been passed and signed (by the governor). It is law. Is most comprehensive voter verified paper trail in the country and the best auditing trail in the country.
1. Legistative report by Michael DeRosa: following campaign finance reform issues and have been in touch with CCAG. Anybody interesting with working on this please see me after the meeting.
2. 6-13-05 and 7-11-05 EC meeting minutes: deferred to next SCC meeting by consensus due to time constraints.
D. Proposal:
1. EC proposal: What: Have voting members sign-in on sheet at each SCC meeting. Goal: to assist the Secretary with the count of voters, if votes are taken during the SCC meeting. Judy: can this sign-in sheet in the minutes and can there be put on the Website? Aaron: sure. As long as Barbara provides me with the information. Passed by consensus.
1. GPAX report by Justine McCabe: 2nd annual Antiwar Movement will be On Saturday, 11-5-05 at CCSU. $100 donation from GPCT was suggested: passed by consensus. GPAX will interact with 2 other groups. Consensus to continue with working with the groups as GPCT has supported in the past.
1. Judy, treasurer, has asked for a formal written quote from Shoreline Chapter for the monies needed for their Shoreline Proposal.
9. Michael: called Pearl Williams, at Secretary of State’s office re: new procedure for the candidates to do: Pearl Williams affirmed that each new candidate must have the 2 designated people, on the back of the Party Designation form, send a letter to the Secretary of State, endorsing the candidate in question. This must be done by August 12, 2005. Kelly reaffirmed this. Both of the designees must sign the endorsing letter.