Message: 1 Date: Mon, 11 Nov 2013 19:02:26 -0500 From: Audrey Clement Subject: Re: [gpva-discuss] Changing party bylaws To: J F GALDO , Tamar Yager Cc: [email protected] Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=iso-8859-1; reply-type=original Joe, The function that you wish to ascribe to the Central Committee is now performed by the Interim Committee. I heartily agree that GPVA should nominate its own candidates. In fact current Bylaws proscribe GPVA from endorsing a non-party candidate when theres a party candidate in the race. But if GPVA can only mount one local candidacy per year then nominating candidates for statewide office is a pipe dream. So what you are calling for in effect is that GPVA exercise no influence on elections at all at the statewide level. Audrey -----Original Message----- From: J F GALDO Sent: Saturday, November 09, 2013 2:03 PM To: Tamar Yager Cc: [email protected] Subject: Re: [gpva-discuss] Changing party bylaws I agree with Tamar that bylaw changes should be addressed at regular meetings, but that doesn not prevent us from discussing them beforehand. So I will comment on the general thrust of the proposed changes. First, the Green Party is a political party not a 501(c)(3) activist group. Political realities demand that the party be structured ro reflect the political subdivisions od our state. Furthermore, if we are a serious party, even though we do not now qualify as a recognized political party (major party) in Virginia, we should follow the requirements prescribed for such parties in the Virginia code, which also rewuires this. In addition, the principles of grassroots democracy should suggest a structure based on political subdivisions, which in most is generally based on geography. That is, the voters in a district, therefore, green party members in a district, should determine who the nominees are for office in that district. Members from Richmond or Hampton Roads should not determine who is on the ballot for Board of Supervisors in Fairfax County. Since the primary purpose of the Green Party is to elect individuals to public office who will support green values, our structure should reflect this purpose. Second, rather than further decentralizing the day-to-day operation of the state party, I believe this should be more centralized, while I also believe that the policy development and candidate nomination processes should be more decentralized than they now are. We tend to lump these together, but they are quite different, and probably contributes to our disfunctional behavior. The bylaws provide for a Central Committee, as required by state law, but it is a shell organization with no real functionality. My opinion is that we should have a functioning Central Committee that is responsible for the operation of the state party between annual conventions, and that we intstitute an annual convention with a specified number of voting delegates from each local, and model ourselves more like the GPUS, other green state parties and the major parties. I believe this will allow us to be more efficient in actually getting things done. Third, it is silly to endorse another political partys candidate. Our central focus should be on building the party to the point where we have a candidate in every major election. This is what created the opportunity for the Libertarians this year. Build the Green Party, not the Libertarian Party or other third party. This does not mean that we should not join with them, as we have in the past, on specific issues where we have a shared interest, such as ballot access. Joe
Posted on: Tue, 12 Nov 2013 13:57:00 +0000