Wednesday, April 11th, 2012
WASHINGTON COUNTY DEMOCRATS
Meeting, April 11, 2012
Washington County Democrats met Wednesday, April 11, 2012, at 7 p.m. in a second floor meeting room of the Washington Public Library. Eighteen people attended.
Chairman Peter Morrison called the meeting to order and led the group in the Pledge of Allegiance.
Pete asked about any changes to the minutes for the county convention and the March meeting. There was no comment, so they will be filed in our archives.
Treasurer Kay Ciha distributed copies of the financial report for March 10 to April 11, 2012. Cash balance on March 10, 2012, was $2,151.83. Income during that period came from memberships, donations and shirts at the county convention, and amounted to $577.00. Expenses were $90.74, to Custom Impressions for county convention copies. Cash available on April 11, 2012, was $2,638.09. The treasurer’s report will be filed for audit.
Pete gave the Report of the Chair, and copies were available of district and state convention delegates and alternates. Also, Arrangements, Rules, Platforms, etc., are in place for 2nd District. Those people have attended the various committee meetings and a platform has been developed from the 2nd District. There are new rules and regulations regarding the makeup of the 2nd District. The 2nd District convention is April 28, and preparations are in progress. We will need to make arrangements for that. Regarding the Washington Democrats’ paying for the convention expenses for the delegates and alternates, Kay said the delegates and alternates can pay their fees, etc., and we can reimburse them.
Committee Reports. Adhali Larios announced that he would be running for 2nd District Affirmative Action position. However, he has mandatory military training so cannot be at the meeting. Pete added that Adhali had been attending all the 2nd District meetings and also working with Sarah Sedlacek in her campaign.
Old Business. Pete reminded people that county dues are now due. Since this is an election year, he would appreciate everyone’s signing up and being ready to serve in the parades, at the county fair and other events.
Supervisor candidates were invited to speak. Richard Gilmore said he had attended a Free County debate and had met some of the Republican opponents. He said he was not sure how well the Republicans are going to do against the incumbents. The Free County members are for no zoning, and they have also now picked up the Richmond situation with RUSS (Regional Utilities Systems Services). He said the Republicans got us into this mess and Democrats will have to get us out of it. Planned Parenthood was also at issue, as to whether it should be partially funded or dropped.
Kay clarified the supervisor districts up for election this year -- they are districts 1, 2 and 4. When the districts were changed, she was in District 2 and is now in District 1. The incumbent will not seek re-election. Two Republicans are running, Jack Seward Jr. and Matthew Latham. Kay is the only Democrat running, so she will have no contest in the primary election on June 5. She said Democrats are outnumbered in District 1, which is heavily Republican, but they’re a lot of Independents and she has already picked up a lot of Republican votes. She stated that, if candidates indicate what they stand for, usually they do pretty well. The zoning ordinance and the Richmond fiasco will be addressed. Kay discussed the Richmond debacle: The state hygienic lab lost the samples from Richmond and there is no indication whether samples are human or otherwise. The Richmond residents who are against RUSS have filed two lawsuits.
Jim Gorham asked if Kay could resolve this issue without negative impact on her campaign.
Kay stated that Shiloh’s lagoon is going, and she believes the Shiloh people will wait until the Richmond lagoon is finished and then will hook up to it without any charge. Upon questioning, Kay said she plans to use her energy to get to the bottom of this problem and also the fact that the supervisors didn’t listen to the people who put them into office, regarding the Richmond situation and the zoning ordinance. These are things the majority didn’t want, and that got put through. Kay offered to answer any questions and said Richard would do the same thing.
Terry Philips said there was one more person running for supervisor in District 2, and mentioned the possible need to hold a special convention for naming her as candidate. Dawn McCoy lives in Riverside and is running for the District 2 supervisor seat. Dawn was introduced.
There was debate about the possible special convention. Kay clarified that Dawn can run as a write-in candidate in the primary. If she gets a certain number of votes (around 46 or 48), her name will automatically be on the November ballot. If she doesn’t get the required number of votes, then we will have a convention after the primary and will nominate her by convention -- and from that process her name will be on the November ballot. Only District 2 residents can vote, and in order to vote they must be present at that special convention.
Dawn spoke, and said she has some political experience. She was mayor of Riverside and on the Riverside city council.
New Business. Pete said the governor is disappointed to lose the lawsuit on Workforce Development and is thinking of doing away with Workforce Development entirely.
An Events Committee chair is needed and Pete asked if anyone would be willing to serve on that. Adhali asked about it, and this chairmanship involves organizing the various events such as parades. A worker with the Obama campaign (Allison) is like the OFA of this area for activities and is trying to recruit some more people. She wrote to Pete, wanting a lot of different sites for various meetings and events, etc., to be provided to her. For events and appearances on the state or national level, she would like to have locations in place for them.
Before the election, events would include parades during the summer. After that, we will need to set up a headquarters office. The Events chair is not really in charge of that but could organize some events to be held within the office.
Pete plans on doing to try to establish the whole parade schedule by May.
John Greener said he didn’t want to be Events chair but could be someone’s right-hand man. John has offered his home to U.S. Rep. Dave Loebsack on Saturday, May 5, from 1 to 2:30 p.m. John will provide beverages such as coffee and lemonade, and asked that we supply some desserts to go with them. A number of people offered to help with that. As for how many people to expect, consensus was that there would probably be 30 to 40 people attending.
Henry Marquard spoke for the Loebsack campaign. He said he is here after a leave of absence, to again work on Loebsack’s campaign. He provided a copy of upcoming things. He said the redistricting meant Loebsack went from a Plus-7 advantage district to a Plus-4 -- making the campaign a lot more expensive and difficult. We lost Linn County from the old district and picked up 10 new ones. It will be, he reiterated, an expensive campaign. The Republican challengers are on the watch list -- top picks, which will be gunning for Dave. The present campaign promises to be at least as difficult as, and probably more so than, the last campaign was. They are looking at him as a Liberal who can speak well to Independents and moderates. We face high Republican places like Bettendorf and Pella, which are “high-money Republican areas.” The opponent is taking on our entire party because of gay rights, contraception, etc. Jobs are going to be a big focus for us. John Archer of John Deere has resided in Iowa for only two years. Dan Dillon, in the real estate business, lives in Blue Grass, and he could reportedly self-fund a campaign with his great wealth. He is socially moderate and fiscally conservative. Archer is all-around conservative. Archer, it is believed, was recruited in Washington; D.C. Republicans are doing everything they can into taking Democrats out of the Senate. We will need to really focus on getting Democrats to vote and also to persuade swing voters. Henry invited anyone to ask questions. His phone number is 563-299-7568, and his e-mail address is:>henry@loebsackforcongress.org<.
For events, parades, etc., we need to learn the dates and therefore our involvement, and we should have the parades-events schedules available by the May 9 meeting. There is a 2nd District meeting Sunday. They are trying to resolve any conflicts within the various committees. The 2nd District is hoping to have every county provide some kind of basket unique to the county, which will be raffled off. Robin Plattenberger volunteered to make the basket from Washington County. We will discuss parade participation May 9.
The next monthly meeting will be held May 9, 2012 at 7:00 p.m. in the 2nd floor meeting room at the Library.
Respectfully submitted,
Nan Stark, Secretary
