May 21, 2006, Meeting of the Triangle Area Green Party

Meeting convened at 4:30 PM at the ACRE space in Raleigh. Attending were Elena Everett, Hart Mathews, Ed King, Susan OÕNeill, Wayne Turner, May Becker, Monzoor Chema, and Ben Carroll.

Minutes:

First order of business was a report on activity related to the GRIM movement in the Triangle area. Wayne reported that GRIM had a planning meeting on Friday, May 19, but he was unable to attend. A meeting is planned for Pittsboro on Tuesday May 23, which Wayne plans to attend and will report to the local. Wayne will propose to GRIM a planning meeting for late June, to be held with the Tri-greens. Wayne will also forward to GRIM the national and state resolutions, posting to the BLOG or mailing list as appropriate.

Hart spoke about the Energy At The Crossroads tour. He spoke for 2 minutes at a morning press conference covered by News 14. Hart and Wayne set up a table at the event that evening. The event was poorly attended, but they talked to people at the event and some took GP literature. One person signed for the e-newsletter.

Hart and Elena attended the minimum wage rally at the Legislature. Former Senator John Edwards and the Reverend Barbour of the NC NAACP spoke at the rally, which was well attended. The rally was sponsored by the NC Fair Wage Coalition, whose members are potential allies in our legislative fight.

The next topic was ballot access, which is the primary thrust of todayÕs meeting. Per our previous meeting, the proposed coalition is the NC Open Elections Coalition. The coalition has four primary target organizations as members. They are the Libertarian Party, Common Cause, Democracy NC, and ____________. Democracy NC and Common Cause are already involved in election issues such as independednt resistricting, campaign finance reform, and IRV.

The other groups/coalitions which we are proposing to approach are the League of Women Voters, NC-PIRG, and the NC Peace and Justice Coalition. Susan proposed that we add SURGE to the list. Ben will talk to SURGE, and also spoke on behalf of Students for Progressive Action in the Triangle, committing their support to the Coalition.

Wayne has been in touch with Grey Newman, who offered to investigate the best way to approach the LWV. Wayne will follow-up with Gray. Hart is also approaching the Bill of Rights Committee in Durham, but Wayne needs to find contact info for Joan Walsh, of the Durham BORC. Wayne will send e-mail or call Wes Hare for contact information. Elena is also going to pursue Black Workers for Justice.

Hart read the existing petition language to the group. After some modifications to make the language less specific in regards to the content of the bill, the meeting voted to adopt the language. Hart will post the petition to an online petition site. Language for a resolution is not yet written.

Wayne is responsible for getting out draft editorial letters this week.

Within the next two weeks Hart will organize a press conference, after the main groups are on board

The main June event for the Tri-Greens will be a ballot access forum. We have selected the date of June 21. Ben believes we can get the Unitarian Church to host the event. In a previous meeting we had agreed to a format of 5 speakers/panel members with a Green moderator, who will also make a few remarks. Each speaker would have 10 minutes. There would be a 45 minute allowance for a question-and-answer period.

We need (1) a commitment from the Unitarians to host the event (BEN), (2) the Unitarians to contact Wayne about sound system requirements (BEN), (3) ELENA and HART to round up speakers, (4) event advertisement (ELENA and HART?), and (5) fliers (BEN, SUSAN?) The event needs to be in the Indy calendar by the first week in June. Ed will be available to help after the first week in June.

Hart will work on a press release for the event. Elena will post the event on Cosmopolity and possibly other similar websites (as I recall). Manzoor will forward the event announcement to additional calendars.

We will table at this event and will have a collection jar for the coalition, in order to defray printing expenses and so forth.

Manzoor spoke about his meeting with the Israeli Committee Against House Demolition (ICAHD). TriGreens will promote ICAHDÕs agenda in light of a GPUS resolution calling for economic divestment from Israel. Since ICAHD is based in Chapel Hill, Wayne will propose to the Orange-Chatham Greens that we investigate hosting an event with them wherein house demolition and divestment are discussed in a forum format, public invited. The Coalition for Peace with Justice in Chapel Hill may be interested in getting involved as well. Space may be available for this at Arcadia, Jerry might know more? With current commitments to legislative issues, it may be August before we can do this.

Next formal meeting will be June 11, 4 PM at ACRE.

I have a line in my notes about something on May 31st, Wedneday. Can someone please refresh my memory about this?