Cville Dems

The Charlottesville Democratic Committee

Meetings

8/2 Executive Committee Meeting (Wednesday, not Monday!)

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Due to scheduling conflicts, we won’t have our regularly scheduled July 24 Full Committee meeting; instead, there’ll be an Executive Committee meeting on Wednesday, August 2, 6:30pm at Rives Park. The agenda includes:

  • plans for this year’s “Turn Out the Vote” (Thursdays at Ix Art Park, see below)
  • Summer Bash and Summer Picnic wrap-ups
  • discussion of Primary results

If you have any topics to add to the agenda, please let John know: cvilledemschair@gmail.com

“Turn-Out-the-Vote Thursdays” Resumes 8/10!

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Poster using a wide variety of different letter and background colors used with the words "Turn out the Vote Thursdays phone bank grab a bite at a food truck write postcards to voters"Turn-Out-the-Vote Thursdays will resume on Thursday, August 10, 4-7pm, on the grass at Ix Art Park. It’s a friendly group, with plenty of time to chat and catch up while we work, and we’ve added the extra hour (4pm start) to accommodate as many people’s schedules as possible.

Mary Ann Harris, Nancy Damon, Suzanne Michels, Noemi Paz, and John Shepherd have been planning goals and volunteer opportunities for November’s election (less than four months away!).

As in the previous election cycles, the group will be:

  • Writing postcards and making follow-up phone calls to the newly Charlottesville registered voters signed up by our Voter Registration Team. That combination has been very successful, resulting in voting at an 80% rate in 2020 and 2022, and at a 75% rate in 2021.
  • Distributing “walk sheet” name and address lists of Dem-leaning people for our campaign canvassers to visit.
  • Sending some specific issue-message postcards (a new idea we’re considering).
  • Writing postcards and phoning Albemarle residents we’ve registered.
  • Writing postcards and phoning for campaigns near Charlottesville; we really want to win control of the House of Delegates and hold the Senate!
  • Perhaps organizing a canvassing trip or two!

Consider one or more of these options and hopefully join in on whichever one(s) sound good to you!

Please contact Mary Ann Harris with any questions: harrisma49@gmail.com

REPORT: Full Committee Meeting (5/22/23)

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The Full Committee met at the Forest Hills Park’s picnic shelter. The highlights:
1) A number of candidates came early to meet and chat with members pre-meeting: Dave Norris, Bellamy Brown, Katrina Callsen (House of Delegates candidates), Michael Payne, Lloyd Snook (City Council candidates), and Amanda Burns (School Board candidate).
2) We had a quorum and were able to approve two bylaws changes necessitated by the City’s changed precinct lines (see last issue for explanation). Thanks to Dave Chapman and Erin Monaghan for crafting the approved amendments.
3) Jason’s Treasurer’s Report focused on our June 2 Summer Bash Fundraiser (more above!). Lynlee Thorne, Rural GroundGame’s Political Director, will be the guest speaker. So far, we’ve received or have pledges for $12,000, getting close to our current $13,000 goal. To purchase tickets, donate, or get more event info, please go to https://secure.actblue.com/donate/2023summerbash .
4) The voter registration team continues to do registrations and rights restorations at IX Park (Saturday mornings) and other locations (see below).
5)Jim Nix reported that the City Registrar’s data shows early voting turnout is good: 670 votes already cast and over 1,500 mail ballots sent out.
6) Date and location of our Charlottesville City Council Candidates Forum (held last night at Buford) was announced. We noted the 6/4 Martha Jefferson Neighborhood Assoc. candidates forum (see calendar above).
7) For our Monday June 26 picnic with the Albemarle County Dems we just have to organize a few games (see below).
8) The 5th District Dems hosted a summit for all committee chairs on April 29, focusing on committees that are operating in a “sea of red”. The 5th District’s Fall Extravaganza is scheduled for September 30 at the University of Lynchburg.
9) The Democratic Party of Virginia (DPVA) will hold its annual fundraiser on Friday 6/23 in Richmond. Rep. Bennie Thompson (of January 6 Commission fame!) and Paul Begala are announced speakers. For info and tickets go to bluecommonwealthgala.com .
10) DPVA has determined that the party will use conventions to select delegates for the 2024 Democratic National Convention, so we can look forward to local committee caucuses next year!

Full Committee Meeting (Monday 5/22 at Forest Park, unusual 6pm start)

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Six cartoonish (faceless) people sitting around a meeting tableOn Monday May 22 the Full Committee will meet, weather permitting, at the Forest Hills Park picnic shelter, 1000 Forest Hills Park Ave., starting at 6pm; the unusual start time gives primary candidates a final Full Committee opportunity to informally meet and chat with members before the primary. Please bring your own chair and an extra if possible. If rain (or snow!) is forecast, we’ll email everyone to switch to Zoom.
Tentative agenda item highlights (after the candidate time ends):
  1. Assuming we can get a quorum (so please attend if you can!!), vote to amend our bylaws to reflect precinct redistricting necessitated by the 2020 census (details in last month’s newsletter). The proposed amendment language, with full explanation, is here.
  2. Volunteers will be needed to staff current polling places and the two old polling places (Alumni Hall and Tonsler) on Primary Day to answer voters’ questions and thank them for coming out to vote.
  3. June 2 Summer Bash Fundraiser report (see below).
  4. Charlottesville City Council Candidate forum on May 24 (see below).
  5. June 26 picnic with Albemarle Dems (see below).
  6. Zoning info forum (see below).

REPORT: Executive Committee Meeting (4/24/23)

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Six cartoonish (faceless) people sitting around a meeting table

Our first in-person Executive Committee meeting since before the pandemic (not counting some hybrid meetings) was held in Rives Park, and the weather thankfully cooperated. Highlights:
Jason Vandever gave a Treasurer’s Report; we’re well within our budget.
We discussed sending a postcard to registered voters in town to make sure that they know about the June 20 Primary.
The precinct lines for Charlottesville have been redrawn, as the City does every 10 years, and when this happens it poses a few temporary but interesting technical challenges we deal with, e.g.:
  • two precincts no longer exist;
  • there are two new precincts that technically have no one representing them, because the precincts did not exist at the time of our last reorganization (and our bylaws don’t address this scenario!);
  • some Precinct reps no longer live in the precincts that they represent due to the redrawn lines;
  • Mike Cameron and Mary Ann Harris have found a very few errors in the VoteBuilder database that put people in the wrong precinct (we’re advising the DPVA’s tech team of these).
To deal with this short-term, it was agreed that:
  • A proposed amendment to the bylaws will be presented for the May 22 Full Committee meeting.
  • In the meantime, precinct leaders will develop an ad hoc reorganization to handle the upcoming election.
We’re looking for suggestions on how to schedule the May 22 Full Committee meeting. We need a quorum to approve the change in the bylaws, so turnout is important, and it’s possible that a Zoom meeting would get a higher turnout. On the other hand, if we have another park meeting, we can invite the Primary candidates to chat with people before and after, and that could help drive turnout. Members are encouraged to share your views with John McLaren: cvilledemschair@gmail.com .
Nancy Damon updated us on the progress of our upcoming June 2 Summer Bash fundraiser (see below!), on the lawn at the Jefferson School African-American Heritage Center. Our goal is $10,000; so far we have $8,000 in sponsorship pledges… please pitch in and help us reach our goal!
There was broad agreement that our party should host an information forum on the City’s zoning reform process (see below).
Nancy reminded us of the opportunity to once again be a sponsor of (and table at) the Chihamba Festival (7/29). The Festival is also hosting a fundraising ball on June 3, and it would be great if local Dems attended that event too.
Based on feedback from the State Senate candidates, who told us there have already been five informational forums scheduled, we decided not to hold another one of our own.
Madison Cummings reminded us of the Albemarle Dems fundraiser May 7, 6-8pm, at Greencroft. In the past, a good number of Charlottesville Democrats have attended this event, and we encourage people to attend this year as well! Rep. Jennifer McClellan will be the guest speaker.

Executive Committee Meeting Monday 4/24 6:30pm

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Six cartoonish (faceless) people sitting around a meeting table
We’re trying to find an outdoor location that will hold 20+ people with some social distance, we’ll email everyone Sunday or Monday with a Zoom link and a physical location if found.
Agenda highlights:
1. Meet the officers of Rally PVCC (see below), a new PVCC student organization aiming to mobilize students to become more engaged in the civic life of the greater Charlottesville community
2. Final list of candidates (and thanks to all who helped, see below)
3. Discuss logistics for various Candidate Forums (see below)
4. Decide whether to hold an informational forum about the Draft Zoning Plan revisions (see below)
5. Update on our June 2 Summer Bash fundraiser (see below).
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