Minutes from the 8-28-07 SCC meeting of Green Party of Connecticut, quorum meet

Place: Portland Public Library, 20 Freestone Avenue, Portland, CT 06480-1818

Phone: 860-342-6770 Time: 6:40PM to 9:00PM

Voting attendees by chapter:
Fairfield (arrived at 7:12PM): Paul Bassler, David Bedell, Richard Duffee;
Greater Hartford: Barbara Barry, Secretary of Green Party of CT; S. Michael DeRosa, Co-chairperson of GP of CT; Christopher Reilly, Treasurer of GP of CT;
New Haven: Jerry Martin;
Northeast: Jean deSmet, Co-chairperson of GP of CT and Amy Vas Nunes;
Clifford Thornton, Co-chairperson of GP of CT.
No non-voting attendees.
Facilitator: Barbara Barry

A. Preliminaries:

1. Introductions of voting attendees; non-voting attendees; chapters; quorum was met; timekeeper= Jean

deSmet; facilitator; ground rules.

2. Approval of tonight’s proposed agenda, deletions: GPUS report due to lack of GPUS representatives. GPUS committee members will present reports, if time allows; addition, it time allows: By-law Committee.

3. Review and approval of minutes of 7-31-07 SCC meeting.

4. Review and acceptance of minutes from the 8-21-07 EC meeting.

5. Treasurer’s report from Christopher Reilly: have balance of $1213.80.

B. Policies and Procedures Committee: The following State Central Committee (SCC) functions were approved by consensus: post SCC and EC minutes on the website; design brochures for the use of chapters as is or that can be customized for individual chapter use; reserve 30% of all contributions for the chapter in which the contributor resides. If the contributor does not reside in an active chapter, then contribution is to go to the most reasonable close active chapter; prepare a State of the Party Report for presentation to the membership at the Annual Meeting. That report should include a brief synopsis of what the Party has accomplished in the past year and outline its plans for the future; produce an Annual Budget for implementation on July 1st of each year; maintain a calendar showing all required or planed events on the Green Party of CT website. Make reasonable effort to anticipate the requirements of these events to efficiently utilize the resources of the Green Party of Ct to insure success.

Deferred for further discussions/feedback: reimburse chapters for costs to contact members when that contact is unplanned but mandated by the SCC; maintain a central membership and contributor list which can be subdivided for use only by any of the Green Party of CT chapters.

CR: historically, the Green Party of CT has a made a decision not to share our membership list with any one or any organization except with Green Party Chapter and candidates for the explicit use for Green Party purposes.

The secretary was asked to bring to the next SCC meeting on 9-25-07, the current valid Bylaws of the

Green Party of CT, and if possible email to Jerry Martin for use by the Policies and Procedures Committee.

C. Reports:

1. Green Party of CT candidates for endorsement by the SC JdS: I am not running on a Green Party Line candidate for First Selectman (i.e. mayor) of Willimantic. I am trying to get rid of people who listen to the Democratic and Republican lines. People do know me as a Green. While, I will not be running on the Green Party Line, I do want candidate funds from GPUS. In order to get these GPUS funds, a candidate must be endorsed by the state Green Party. Therefore, I seek your endorsement. SMD: there is a push within the State Democrats and Republicans can cross-endorse other candidates without that candidate’s knowledge or consent. This came about by the 2007 little known legislative law which allowed 3rd parties, petitioning parties and any candidate to cross-endorse major party candidates. Example: A Socialist candidate endorsing Governor Jody Rell. This action might not be liked by the endorsed candidate and it does not address what, if any, agreements have been made between the candidates. This law seems to benefit the Working Families Party of CT more than any actual or potential party or candidate. AVN: Jean is known as a Green; this decision is a local Green Party decision. SMD: this sought of coalition has been done in the past by the Willimantic/Northeast Green Party and it did not work. It failed because the only coalition members to keep their promise (to work for coalition members) were the Greens. Then other coalition members mandated that the elected Green Party coalition candidate, not use the Green Party name. We need to learn from past actions and continue to get our own GP concepts out to the voters and show we are different from the major parties. Additionally, the local GP will lose their Green Party Line and affects local voter ability to register as Green Party voters. JdS: petitioning can be redone. DB: I think these kinds of coalitions should be done cautiously. Coalitions appear to work best when working for similar issues/concerns but not for candidates. Consensus: GP of CT endorses Jean deSmet.

2. Political issues the GP of CT has addressed with legislators during the 2008 Legislative Session: SMD: Fight the Hike group is still meeting and planning to address 2008 legislative issues.

3. CT Green Times: SMD: has no newspaper for this meeting due to lack of articles. Will have for next SCC meeting, if articles are provided to me in a timely manner.

4. Our websites: CR: the HYPERLINK http://www.ctgreens.com/ website ownership was renewed by Aaron Gustafson, of Hamden. He was a former Green Party of CT member and Co-chairperson in 2005. Currently the following people also have access to it: Christopher Reilly to update the calendar; David Bedell to post endorsed candidates from this GP. Jerry Martin assists as needed. SMD: Eric DeVos has deferred putting in more portals until 10-07.

Consensus: need to put news on this website, daily.

5. Impeachment of Bush/Cheney by town resolutions for impeachment of Bush/Cheney: RD: Congressional House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi was in Stamford recently. She does not support articles of impeachment. Goal of getting town resolutions is to have our CT State Legislature pass a resolution of impeachment. Congressional rules allow that a resolution of impeachment, passed by a state legislature, can be brought to the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives, to be acted upon. The Democratic CT State Central Committee (CSCC) will be having a meeting on 9-26-07 and will vote on whether to support an article for impeachment of Bush and Cheney. Some of these elected members are or have moved away from the Pelosi position. The primary obligations of these members are to the town voters and to the State Democratic Party and not to Pelosi. We need people to contact their Democratic officials. Congressman, Christopher Murphy, has promised to bring to Congress any CT Legislative impeachment resolution.

6. ACLU lawsuit: SMD: no news.

7. Chapter reports:

Fairfield: DB: we are working on impeachment petitions; seek GP of CT endorsement of our candidate.

Northeast: JdS: I had a fundraiser, 8-26-07, with Cynthia McKinney, a former Democratic Congressperson

from GA.

New Haven: CT: there was a fundraiser on 8-27-07, for Ralph Ferrucci, GP candidate for Mayor of New

Haven. Cynthia McKinney, a former Democratic Congressperson from GA, also attended. She has been

going around the country and meeting with some State Green Parties.

Greater Hartford: SMD: we had our 8-25-07 nominating convention and endorsed David Ionno for

Green Party candidate for Hartford City Council.

9. Date, place and time for next: 9-07 EC and 9-25-07 SCC meetings: to be determined.

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