“Submitted to: Libertarian National Committee, Mar. 7, 2013
Submitted by: James W. Lark, III
Region 5S Representative, Libertarian National CommitteeThis report will provide information concerning activities of the Libertarian Party state affiliates in Region 5S since the LNC meeting on Nov. 17-18, 2012. I shall provide an updated report at the LNC meeting in Rosemont should additional information become available.”
Since the report includes some images and links, I am posting it as an attachment:
It may be of some interest to regular IPR readers since the region covers Pennsylvania, as well as Maryland, West Virginia, DC, Virginia, Delaware and North Carolina.
I posted some comments on this report as well as the Campus Organizing Report also submitted by Dr. Lark to the LNC. Since these comments are in parts editorial in nature, it is against IPR rules for me to include them in these two articles. I will post them as comments on these two posts and leave it up to other IPR writers to decide whether they should be a separate article posted by someone other than myself.
I also brought up the matter of populating the database with districts in opportunity for public comment at the November LNC meeting. I can’t point you to minutes because those minutes haven’t been posted yet and I doubt the secretary even noted public comments (given the sparse information in her minutes for earlier meetings).
I intend to mention the issue in every Virginia report (included in the region 5S report) until the LNC does something to address this critical need.
By the way, Paulie, good luck in your deliberations about your future. I always just kind of fell into each new career direction.
Your guess is as good as mine. Bill Redpath promised me he’d look into it back in mid-January, but now almost two months later I haven’t seen any evidence of any progress whatsoever.
I have asked since June of 2012 for it to be discussed by the LNC, but to my knowledge it has not been an agenda item.
No. It should be considered a mandatory core function. Yes, money can be raised for it, but if we’re supposed to be here to help get candidates elected, providing election districts down to the precinct level is like Politics 101 kinda stuff and it should have been funded a long time ago.
I’ve given the LNC several options. I’m sure a porogrammer or three could offer even more.
Jim Lark’s father passed away a couple of days ago.
My deepest sympathies to a wonderful man.
My comments on the Region 5s report submitted to LNC list follow below the divider. I am submitting these, together with my first comment on the last article (campus organizing report) to be posted as an IPR article by others here, since they contain editorial statements by myself.
Ryan Sabot of DCLP writes
This is a question/problem, along with many other basic nuts and bolts issues, that many local and state LP affiliates face. I think the national LP needs to do more to help the people who are looking for this kind of information find it.
Specifically, http://www.lp.org/campaign-resources has links around the middle of the page
In my experience talking to state and local party LP leaders who are looking for this kind of information, they are not finding it. One approach may be to compile the information from those state party pages and post it directly at LP.org. Another thing we can do is periodically feature some of the materials, with links to the rest, in our email blasts, facebook and twitter posts, LP.org blog, LP videos, etc. We need multiple ways and repetition for this information to find its target audience.
If there is any way in which I may be allowed to assist with such an effort, say in updating the website, I would be willing to do so.
I realize there is fundraising underway to create workshops on this kind of stuff and take them around the country, but in the meantime, we should do what we can to get the information to where it can do some good. Would it be appropriate to put this on the meeting agenda, do we need motions to address this, or how should we go about making some progress in this area?
Dr. Stevens of LPPA writes:
It is true that Starchild has endorsed Steve Scheetz for State Chair. While I am generally sympathetic to the arguments of Steve Scheetz, Ed Reagan and others supporting their slate, I have not issued any formal endorsement. As far as I can remember, the only member of that slate that I have personally met is Richard Schwarz, and I only know him very casually.
It’s entirely untrue that I have any interest in future paid petitioner business out of PA, and it is also entirely untrue that any other petitioners I know have made any endorsements in Pennsylvania. PA requires petitioners to be state residents; the only petitioners I know who live there are Andy and Kevin Jacobs and Darryl Bonner, and I have heard nothing whatsoever from any of them about endorsing any slate of candidates for LP offices – nor have I heard any such endorsements from any petitioners in any other state.
As for myself, I’m weighing my future and whether I should be a petitioner or try to transition to something else. I am inclined towards the latter.
Dr. Stevens has been informed repeatedly that my interest in PA LP controversies has nothing whatsoever to do with my past or possible future business as a petitioner (if there is any such future), and that none of my petition contacts have anything to do with my comments on these matters, yet he persists in spreading these blatant falsehoods repeatedly and has now included them in his region report for official LP dissemination and publication. I am requesting that this false information about myself and my current or former associates be retracted.
I could address quite a few other statements from Dr. Stevens in his regional report that distort the facts, but I will refrain from doing so in this email. Suffice it to say that, besides deviating from the truth, the tone and language of much of that state report (especially the next to last paragraph) is IMO inappropriate for materials that we publish at LP.org (region reports are included with meeting minutes) among other ways that this information is officially disseminated by the national LP organization.
Chuck Moulton of LPVA writes:
I would be curious to know how the amount of money spent on such advertising translates into other measurable party growth indicators such as dues paying members, registered Libertarians (if the commonwealth has that option), number of candidates, vote percentages in the next election, attendance at local events, number of known LP letters to the editor of newspapers, and so on. I hope we begin tracking such results if we haven’t already to compare facebook advertising with various traditional forms of advertising so that interested state parties can decide whether it is the best way to spend their advertising budget or not.
I know this issue has been discussed on this list before, but was any action taken or has any progress been made? If not, should it be on our meeting agenda, or should we have a motion to address it? Should it be a targeted fundraising item? Is there another way of addressing this need that currently exists?
Michael Wilson of LPWV writes:
Are we doing anything to coordinate, facilitate and otherwise help various states in lobbying efforts to make petition requirements more reasonable?
We have a bill like this (S265) we are working on in Alabama, as well as a petitioners rights bill that may be introduced in the legislature. I know other states are working on similar efforts. Can we do anything at the national level to help coordinate these efforts?
And a quasi-related query:
Can we do anything to help coordinate ballot access with campus organizing and local party building activities? I would like to help work on a plan to make our petition efforts do “double duty” in helping us grow the party in other ways.
If anyone on this list would like to work together with me on any of this, please let me know. And if you all can and are willing to get it done without me – please do so! My interest in these matters is not whether I participate or not – I am willing to do so if my help is wanted or needed, or to stay out of the way if it isn’t – only that they get done.
Thanks,
Paul Frankel
415-690-6352