Green Party Watch

Mary DeCamp, Green Party candidate for Mayor of Tucson, Arizona, has her campaign headquarters in a tent at the Occupy Tucson camp. While some politicians might be talking the talk but living comfortably, DeCamp is days away from being evicted as her home is about to face foreclosure.

From Reuters:

(Reuters) – There is no bank of telephones at Mary DeCamp’s campaign headquarters, no volunteers eager to bring her message to the masses.

The Green Party candidate for mayor of Tucson, who is days away from losing her home to foreclosure, is flanked by fellow Occupy Tucson activists as she directs her long shot bid for public office from a borrowed tent in a local park.

“November 10th is my eviction date,” the aptly named candidate said cheerfully on Friday, while unpacking signs after police had pushed Occupy Tucson campers from one park to another a night earlier.

DeCamp could have saved her house, she said, and could have taken handouts from friends and family to keep her mortgage current. But she said she gave up after months of phone calls from the bank hounding her about late payments as she fell further behind.

“I just shut down,” she said.
read more »

On November 8, Portland Maine will hold an election for the first popularly elected Mayor in over 80 years. Furthermore, voters will get to rank the candidates as the election will be using Instant Runoff Voting (IRV), which will be very interesting given that there are 14 candidates on the ballot.

One of those candidates, John Eder, is a former State Legislator, one of a handful of Greens ever elected to State Legislative office in the U.S. Eder, however, did not get the endorsement of the Maine Green Independent Party (MGIP), which has instead endorsed sitting City Councilor David Marshall, also a Green:

“Let there be no mistake about it, David Marshall is the Green choice for Portland’s mayor,” states Nate Shea, MGIP Chair. “His leadership on sustainable transportation, green development, and the creative economy places him among the strongest elected Greens in the nation.”

The Green Independent Party endorses Marshall because of his vision to create a modern streetcar line in Portland, to convert homes and businesses off of oil to cleaner fuels, and to grow the population density to create a more sustainable city as well as his longstanding commitment to helping constituents cut through city bureaucracy. For these reasons, the Green Independent Party strongly urges its members to rank David Marshall as their first choice for Mayor.

On Tuesday, John Eder came out and put his support behind one of his opponents, Ethan Strimling.

The endorsement comes as somewhat of a surprise because of Eder’s background. Eder helped mentor City Councilor David Marshall, the other Green Independent Party candidate running for mayor.

But Eder said Marshall is already on the City Council and “doing great work,” and the city needs fresh leadership. He said with Marshall still there, and Strimling as mayor and Eder advocating from the outside, “we’re going to make a great team for this city.”

There are two more Greens running in Portland on November 8. Josephine Okot is running for Portland School Board, and Jack Safarik is running for Portland Water Board.

Below is Mayoral Candidate David Marshall.

The Syracuse Post-Standard has endorsed New York Green Party leader Howie Hawkins for Syracuse City Council 4th District. From the paper’s endorsement:

Hawkins, who works for UPS, has run more than a dozen times, for everything from governor and senator to mayor and councilor. He advocates for public power in the city to generate jobs and energy savings; a municipal development bank to provide training grants and job-ready employees for local enterprises like grocery, hardware and clothing stores in underserved areas; fully-funded schools and city services through tax reforms that include a city income or commuter tax; enforcement of the city’s living wage ordinance, combined with a “community hiring hall” to increase minority employment in city contracts…

Addressing the frosty relations between councilors and the mayor, Hawkins says if he couldn’t win over the mayor, he would try to build a veto-proof majority on the council. His progressive ideas, common-sense approach and undaunted quest for an opportunity to serve make him the stronger candidate.

In St. Paul, Minnesota, the Twin Cities Daily Planet has published interviews with two Green Party city council candidates. Johnny Howard is running in Ward 1:

“I want to change the culture of leadership,” says Johnny Howard who is competing in the race for the Saint Paul city council against incumbent council member Melvin Carter in Ward One. “Too often, there is a pretense of neighborhood involvement that disguises top-down leadership.”

Read the full interview with Johnny Howard.

Bee Kevin Xiong is running in Ward 6:

What is it like in the day of a city council candidate? Between 9 a.m. and noon, Xiong is in meetings. In afternoon to early evenings, Xiong and his team of volunteers are going door to door, talking to the residents of the sixth ward. He asks what the resident which issues they are concerned about in the ward and then explains his plan and why he’s running for city council. “I’m endorsed by the Green Party, which means we are a grassroots democracy – we care about people. We treat them with dignity and respect. We put people first.”

Read the full interview with Bee Kevin Xiong at the Twin Cities Planet.

The St. Paul Green Party has one more city council candidate and a school board candidate in the upcoming election, which will use instant runoff voting for the first time in the city’s history. Learn more about all the candidates at GreenSaintPaul.org.

MyCentralJersey.com has published interviews with New Jersey Green Party state assembly candidates Steven Welzer (14th District) and Michael Spector (26th District), as well as a letter to the editor from Welzer. An exerpt from Welzer’s interview:

How would you improve on your opponent’s record? I would bring an alternative perspective into a legislature that is bogged down in business-as-usual ineffectual polarization. Green Party positions are distinctive from those of both the Republicans and the Democrats. As might be expected, we are stronger on fighting environmental degradation. read more »

Philadelphia Green Party Sheriff candidate Cheri Honkala was recently interviewed on PressTV. Here is an excerpt of the interview, which is available on PressTV as both video and text:

Philadelphia, where I live, was just named the poorest city in the country. And we have children that go to bed every day in our country that are hungry. We have over 3 million homeless people. And like I said earlier, every 7 seconds a family is losing their home now in this country.

There is no reason for that; we have the ability to provide people with the healthcare. We have the ability to provide everybody with all the necessities of life. We just have a serious problem, we have one political party in this country and that represents corporate America. We don’t have a political system that represents the people, and that is the only reason that I have decided to run for Sheriff.

From the Green Party of the United States:

WASHINGTON, DC — Green Party candidates have continued to receive endorsements in local races across the US.

59 Greens will be on ballots in the November 8, 2011 general election. Ten Greens have been elected to public office in elections held earlier this year, out of 34 candidates who competed.

Green candidates in St. Paul, Minnesota, received several endorsements. For the first time, St. Paul will use Ranked Choice Voting (also called Instant Runofff Voting) in City Council elections, which will increase the chances of a Green election victory.

TakeAction Minnesota, a progressive grassroots coalition, has endorsed Jim Ivey for Ward 2 (http://iveyforsaintpaul.org) and Bee Kevin Xiong (http://xiongforsaintpaul.org) for Ward 6 in City Council races.
http://www.takeactionminnesota.org/_assets/document/St._Paul_City_Council_Endorsements.pdf
http://iveyforsaintpaul.org/news/jim-ivey-endorsed-takeaction-mn

United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1189 has also endorsed Mr. Ivey and Mr. Xiong.
http://www.ufcw789.org/newsletter/vol2issue5.pdf
http://iveyforsaintpaul.org/news/united-food-and-commercial-workers-endorse-jim read more »

Dirk Langeveld at the New London Patch has published 5 Green candidates’ responses to a questionnaire sent to all local candidates. Jessica Cartagena, Kenric Hanson, and Joan Sullivan Cooper are running for City Council. Ronna Stuller and Mirna Martinez are running for the Board of Education. With 5 local candidates, the New London Greens are one of the most electorally active Green Party chapters in the country this year.

Read the article at the New London Patch.

Terry Baum, Green Party candidate for Mayor of San Francisco, speaking at the Occupy San Francisco event. (OccupySF does not endorse any political candidates).

In Portland, Maine’s largest city, the city’s first mayoral election in decades features two candidates from the Green Independent Party: former State House member John Eder and City Councilor David Marshall. Both have been featured recently in the Portland Press Herald.

In his interview, Eder said that affordable housing would be the central issue in his administration:

“We’re on the verge of the creative economy toppling the artists and workers who helped make Portland become what it is,” he said. “We can’t lose those people.”

Marshall pointed to a record of accomplishment in five years on the council and presented his plan:

Marshall’s five-point platform includes investing in the city’s school facilities, converting homes and businesses from oil to alternative fuels, and creating a streetcar line.

Those programs would cost a significant amount up front, as some opponents have pointed out. Marshall calls them “investments.” He points to a record of saving the city money.

The election will be conducted using instant runoff voting, which Green Anna Trevorrow played a key role in enacting as a member of Portland’s charter commission. Ben Chipman, an independent State House member who is closely aligned with the Greens, is also quoted in the article about Marshall.

Newsworks recently published an article about Brian Rudnick, a Green Party member who is running for Philadelphia City Council in the 8th District:

It’s 4:30 p.m., and Brian Rudnick’s campaign office swarms with staffers. About 15 field workers, many area college students, criss-cross the cozy, second-floor space on the 7100 block of Germantown Avenue in Mt. Airy, chatting and grabbing a quick bite before hitting the street to canvass.

With weeks to go until Philadelphia’s general election,  the independent candidate for City Council has assembled a small army to help spread the word that the Eighth District ballot box will feature two hopefuls, a choice, in 2011.

Read the full article at Newsworks.

From the New York Green Party:

Howie Hawkins needs your help to get elected to Syracuse City Council!

Howie won over 40% of the vote the last time he ran for this seat, and that was after having to petition like crazy to get on the ballot. This time, with ballot status, important endorsements from labor and media, and the state and county-wide exposure he earned last year, he has a great chance to win. But that victory is *far* from a foregone conclusion! The Democratic Party machine is ever-formidable and will not roll over.

Here is a summary of the key policies Howie will promote as 4th District Councilor: read more »

In two four-way special elections yesterday in Pittsfield, MA and Minneapolis, MN, Green Party candidates took second place. In Massachusetts’ 3rd Berkshire State Representative district, Green-Rainbow Party candidate Mark Miller finished close behind Democrat Tricia Farley-Bouvier, although the final vote count is not yet clear. From Ballot Access News:

Some sources say Miller lost by only 92 votes, and some say he lost by 192 votes. He placed second, with either 30% or 32% of the total. The winning Democrat, Tricia Farley-Bouvier, polled 33%.

In Minnesota’s 61st State Senate district, Farheen Hakeem finished second with 22% to 68% for Democrat Jeff Hayden. In both races, the Green candidate outpolled a Republican and an independent.

Green Party candidates are running in two special elections scheduled for October 18th, one each in Pittsfield, MA and Minneapolis, MN.

In Pittsfield, Mark Miller is running for Massachusetts State Representative in the 3rd Berkshires District. Miller earned 45% of the vote for the same office in 2010. For more information on his campaign, check out his website.

In Minneapolis, Farheen Hakeem is running for Minnesota State Senate in District 61. Hakeem took 30% of the vote in a 2008 run for MN State House. For more information on her campaign, check out her website.

In Arlington, Virginia, the Sun-Gazette reports that the Green Party is planning a November 2nd meeting to discuss get-out-the-vote strategy for Audrey Clement, who is running against 2 Democratic incumbents for Arlington County Board.

In Tucson, Arizona, the Daily Star reports that Tucson City Council candidate Beryl Baker is making a controversial local development project a major campaign issue.

And in New York City, Green Party member Steve Syrek talked to the New York Daily News about the Occupy Wall Street movement and his role at the Occupy Wall Street library.