The Charlottesville Democratic Committee
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:
If you have any topics to add to the agenda, please let John know: cvilledemschair@gmail.com
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:
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
Jeremy Jones is taking the reins from Bekah Saxon and Kristin Clarens after two election cycles of their good and gracious tutelage (and his prior 2020 experience working as an election official on Election Day). Jeremy really enjoys helping people on Election Day, when everyone’s excited about casting their ballots and having their say in who governs.
Jeremy is looking to expand the VoPro Team to not only cover all the Charlottesville precincts in November, but also hopefully to help out in some other key VA races across the state, so everyone who’s eligible to vote gets to do so.
Voter protection requires a lot of behind-the-scenes work, so there are many ways you can pitch in. The main three:
1. Observe polling place operations and use an online system to file reports of any problems with the State Democratic Party’s boiler room of lawyers ready to handle them. You don’t have to be a lawyer to do this! The only prerequisites are:
Two examples of issues last year’s team helped with:
2. “Chase and cure” (remote work, flexible schedule over the six weeks of early voting) — after a bit of training, help voters fix problems with their mail-in absentee ballots so those ballots can be counted (e.g. when someone gives a PO Box mailing address rather than the required street address).
3. Help staff the Voter Protection Hotline (also remote) — answer problem report phone calls and then try to resolve those problems. This also requires training.
If you might be willing to get involved in these kinds of efforts, please contact Jeremy: hijeremyjones@gmail.com
NOTE: Threats to our elections are not hypothetical… VA counties not so far from us are under attack and we need to stay vigilant! For example:
“Allegations of misconduct and incompetence have bombarded the Buckingham County election office since last November …. after the entire office chose to resign rather than tolerate the accusations, a staff of four has been replaced by a staff of two …. The chairwoman of the Buckingham County Republican Committee who is now trying to assuage voter concerns may be the very reason voters had concerns in the first place … two sources told The Daily Progress that [Republican Committee chairwoman Ramona] Christian emailed an unsubstantiated document to the local Republican Party that claimed absentee ballots in the county’s 2022 General Election came from nonresidents.” Daily Progress, 7/11/23
Everyone on the Voter Registration Team (and anyone who’d like to join!) needs to be certified each year, defined as July 1-June 30; even folks who’ve done it for years still need to recertify. The two online options, self-study or instructor-led online sessions, are explained on the VA Dept of Elections website. The earlier people sign up the better!
We held our primary on June 20th. As Democrats, we believe in competition, and as a sign of our healthy, vigorous party, we had plenty of competition on the 20th! Our candidates for state and local races ran vigorous campaigns, full of positive ideas and proud Democratic values.
This is good for our party and for the Commonwealth, because it allows voters to see Democrats debating how best to move our economy forward to include everyone; to protect rights to healthcare; to increase access to housing; to prevent gun violence; to protect our environment; and to provide a better future for all Virginians. Republican primaries, on the other hand, tend to be contests to see which candidate can best attack the most vulnerable minority scapegoat of the moment; voters see this and notice the difference. Thanks to all of our candidates for making it clear what Democratic Party values are all about.
In the city council primary, Natalie Oschrin, Michael Payne, and Lloyd Snook won the nominations, congratulations to them… and thank you, Dashad Cooper and Bob Fenwick, for running and campaigning with honor and making us all proud.
In the 54th House of Delegates District primary, Katrina Callsen won the nomination; congratulations Katrina, and thank yous to Dave Norris and Bellamy Brown for running and consistently promoting beautiful Democratic values.
In the Senate District 11 primary, Creigh Deeds won the nomination. Congratulations, Creigh, and thank you Sally Hudson for running and standing for good government for all.
A SPECIAL WORD OF THANKS to the volunteers at the polling stations on primary day, who greeted voters and provided useful information, as well as to the precinct chairs who organized them. And to all the campaigns’ staff members and volunteers who knocked on countless doors and spread their candidates’ messages; you’ve all helped our party grow!
The voters were the real winners of this affirmation of the democratic process. Now we look forward to the general election in November, where we need to ensure that our excellent candidates win the offices we nominated them for!
This website is paid for by the Charlottesville Democratic Committee and is not affiliated with any office holder or candidate.