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[Chadlupkes]

Chadlupkes 8,872 edits since December 20, 2005

8,872

User:Chadlupkes/Washington State Progressive Movement

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Contents

[edit] 2007 Reorganization

The State Progressive Caucus will be having elections in January of 2007 for a new Executive Board and a new direction. Please see the WSPC Reorganization Rules as proposed.

[edit] Candidates

If you would like to be on the Executive Board, feel free to add your name! If you would like to nominate someone else, please sign the nomination with ~~~~. Please read and add to the Endorsements for each candidate. We will bring these with us to the January Reorg.

These are not formal nominations, and we'd love to see some decent competition. So if someone else has their name down for a spot that you want, add yours anyway, then be prepared to present a better vision and plan during the election.

CD Coordinators

These are the CD Coordinators of PDA. Let's fill all 9.

[edit] Vision & Future Plans

The purpose of a political party is to turn the vision and values of its members into public policy. The purpose of a party caucus is to help that mission by providing infrastructure and outreach to the specific community that the members of the caucus comes from. The progressive caucus consists of the following sub-groups:

  • Anti-War
  • Anti-Poverty Advocates
  • Issue based campaigns that support our platform

Many of the other groups that could be part of this list have their own caucuses. See: Washington State Democratic Party/Caucuses We should all be working together to create and become the change that we want to see in our party and our world.

[edit] Name of organization

It has been suggested that the WSPC change our formal name to Washington State Democrats Progressive Caucus to specify that we are the caucus of the Democratic Party. Other possibilities:

  • Leave it as Washington State Progressive Caucus
  • Progressive Democratic Caucuses of Washington - WSDCC (PDCW-WSDCC)

I don't think a name change is necessary. The Washington State Progressive Caucus can be considered one group within the Progressive Democratic Caucuses of Washington. This is an informal organization of local caucuses set up to influence the activities and operation of the local party organizations. The focus of the State Progressive Caucus is to help coordinate the voices of progressives within the Washington State Democratic Party and encourage people to get involved in politics by making it easier for people to learn how to make their voices heard.

[edit] Mission Statement

Adapted from Minnesota's DFL Party

5 Core Goals of the WA State Progressive Caucus:

  • Motivate, educate, and organize Progressives and Democrats to stay in touch with their elected representatives through letters, phone calls, and most of all, citizen lobbying.
  • Motivate, educate, and organize Progressives and Democrats to influence the media through letters, phone calls, and press events.
  • Motivate, educate, and organize Progressives and Democrats to caucus and attend party conventions.
  • Motivate, educate, and organize Progressives and Democrats to reshape the Democratic Party in the image they would like to see.
  • Get Progressives and Democrats elected to office.

[edit] Perspectives

Please add your comments below and sign your name!
We really have to nail down what we are trying to do. To me, it's creating something that works to get and keep people engaged, educated and empowered. Give the caucuses the strength and the tools to influence legislation and the party instead of having to choose between them. Right now the caucuses are self organized without any visible or tangible support from the state party. The Progressive Caucus needs to be able to provide that support, as well as services needed by the other caucuses. I want to see every caucus with a website, a blog, a mailing list and online fundraising. Chadlupkes 14:34, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Give the issue based groups a political party that they can trust to be able to stand on our own feet and support the bigger picture so they can focus on their silos. Make sure that there is a majority of votes in Olympia to keep things moving in the right direction.

[edit] Uniting the Activist Community

The WSPC has had a rough start, while the progressive movement in our state has been looking for leadership. By leadership, I'm not talking about someone to tell everyone what to do. I'm talking about the need for a facilitator, someone who can be the point of contact for people all over the state who are looking for a way to get engaged, educated and empowered. Pieces of a giant puzzle have started to form, and it's time for that puzzle to be put together. Democracy for Washington, the Progressive Democratic Caucuses of Washington, PDA, the blogs, the thinktanks, and issue based campaigns are all active and they all seem to be working alone. We don't need, and don't want, to see all of the groups merged into a single organization. But we do need to figure out how we can all work together. We need to take stock of the infrastructure we have, whether we're talking about fundraising, communications, the media and the message machines. We need to figure out, as a Progressive Movement, how to set our goals, establish milestones, determine resource requirements and get things done.

[edit] Bylaws

See also: Washington State Democratic Party/Progressive Caucus/Bylaws

While the caucus has been in neutral, we have been operating mostly ad-hoc. The bylaws that were presented in April of 2005 were never completely adopted, due to some questions that were never resolved. And it has not been clear to some members of the Executive Board or the members that we have bylaws to follow at all. There are two sections that are technically still up in the air.

Progressive Delegation

The intention of the Progressive Delegation (PD) was to encourage the formal organization of local level caucuses that would be active in every county, LD and CD. Representatives from these local caucuses would be the group that meets at the WSDCC meetings. This would have been a parallel structure to the WSDCC, which is organized basically the same way. The idea was to encourage the PD members to ride to the meetings with the WSDCC reps, and discuss the upcoming WSDCC decisions and votes during the drive.

Because the bylaws were never formally adopted, this intention was never brought out to the membership, and final approval of the idea was never done. And we have had a difficult time formalizing any membership list.

The creation of such a formal structure is something that we should pursue, but only after we have been operating for a while and have a need for it. It is a direction that we'd like to move, but setting something like that as a requirement up front is going to discourage more than encourage.

Financial accounts

(III) (4) (e) Because Washington state law allows for the transfer of funds from non-exempt (political action) account to exempt (operating) accounts but prohibits the transfer of funds from exempt to non-exempt accounts, all proceeds from fundraising events shall be initially deposited into the non-exempt account and maintained there until such time as the Treasurer needs to transfer funds to pay exempt account expenses.

A question was raised about this section of the bylaws about accuracy. I believe that Larry Kalb was the one who asked this to be put into the bylaws, but we have never had clarification of the issue. We should remove this paragraph from the bylaws and put the Treasurer in charge of these kinds of details. This doesn't need to be in the bylaws.

Barbara Whitt, who is interested in becoming Treasurer, has not yet had the time to attend the PDC financial class for Non-Profits and Political Organizations. We need to help pay for that class. This will help answer the question about the above section.

[edit] Suggestions

  • Finish the merge between the WSPC and the PDCW. It makes no sense to have these be in competition with each other.
  • Congressional District chapters of PDCW should be the same groups as the PDA chapters.
  • Promote the use of the LD & CD level mailing lists, and establish a blog presence so we can keep each other informed. Partner with Washblog to encourage the use of existing infrastructure.
  • Ask the state party if they can create a line item and account in their budget to allow us to keep track of our finances within the existing financial infrastructure.
  • Put people in charge of watching our federal and state elected officials and keeping the grassroots informed of what they are doing.
  • We should work towards the formation of a formal Legislative Progressive Caucus within our elected representatives in Olympia. The Congressional Progressive Caucus is a very strong group in Washington DC, and they are a good example to follow.
  • Encouraging existing local LD, County and City caucuses to follow our lead, join our network and really have an impact.
  • Get candidates' attention with house parties and serious organizational skills.
  • Host candidate forums and events all around the state to encourage people to stand up and articulate our values. The more people we listen to, the more candidates we will be able to find for national delegate or even local office. We dropped the ball in '04, and didn't follow up with our national delegates, most of which were already involved with the party. Let's not drop the ball in '08, and continue to build on what we know to be true, that the leaders in our country are our community leaders, not our political leaders.
  • Pull in Wellstone Action and Progressive Majority to give training, and really develop our candidates. PM is willing to do this already.
  • We need more Handbooks out of the state party. The PCO Handbook is a great resource, and the idea has merit. Two additional subjects that should be developed are a Candidates Handbook and Local Party Handbook. Give candidates and local party officers the lessons learned to get off the ground running.
  • We should work with the American Legion and send progressive students to Boys' State and Girls' State in Ellensburg this upcoming summer. It's $350 per seat. Start empowering our youth.
  • Another potential point of contact we should use for this is Generation Engage, but they are not operating in Washington yet.
  • Don't ignore our base! We need a Seattle Democrats group. We cannot and must not take any vote for granted in any precinct, regardless of how that precinct votes.
  • Put the word out that we are looking for great progressive candidates for Washington Attorney General, Washington Secretary of State, Washington State Treasurer and Washington Commissioner of Public Lands. Start finding those candidates now.
  • Start collecting information on who in Washington is building infrastructure for the 2008 Presidential Primaries. Start building our candidates for delegates at the Precinct level, LD, County, CD and State. Who wants to go to Denver?!

[edit] Fundraising

There are three potential sources for fundraising.

1. Donations. This are the obvious source for operating funds, and it is critical that we make this worth it for potential donors.

2. Sales. We should be selling bumperstickers and buttons. We need to offer services and provide resources.

3. Certificates. This is going to be something new, based on my Donation Savings Account idea. This is not going to be a big chunk at first, but it will grow.

Other ideas as they come up. Comments welcome! Chadlupkes 16:50, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Important References

[edit] Websites

  • pdcw.org
Original domain, registered by Jim Mullins in late 2004. Chad has control of the web pages, Jim has control of the server.
  • be-that-change.com
Current WSPC domain. Owned by Larry Kalb, handled by Mona Marlow.
  • be-that-change.org
Original WSPC domain. Owned by Keith Gourley, broken redirect.

[edit] Blogs

  • pdcw.blogspot.com
Established 11/13/06 by Chad

[edit] Mailing Lists

  • riseup.net
There is a mailing list set up for all 9 Congressional Districts and all 49 Legislative Districts. All except for PDCW43 is under Chad's control.

[edit] Groups on other sites

  • DFA Link
PDCW46 has a group site there.
  • DNC Party Builder
WSPC, setup by Chad. PDCW46 as well.
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