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DISAGREE. I fully back Joseph Scardetta's and Jason Justice's statements. This proposal seems to be a case of the white privileged members of this party to take their frustration out on Andrea for the recall and resignation of Bill Bartlett, whose recall I fully supported. Andrea is extremely important to the future of the Green Party in Colorado, and I find this proposal ridiculous if not childish, and a waste of time. Angela Humphrey Denver Green Party
Absolutely not. Former Dem here and originally a Bernie supporter. I've followed the Greens carefully for about a decade but did not make the switch until after moving to Denver and working with Andrea. I have had nothing but support from her (I'm a white woman, former Dem, former Bernie supporter, so none of the allegations listed hold true in my experience). I have watched Andrea encourage persons of all sexual identities, racial identities and education levels to fit in where they can get in. I'm with the Green party now because I believe strongly that the only way this country gets better is if we get beyond this patriarchal white supremacist capitalist system (after all, that is what I've read in the platform). I've seen the “offending” conversations on Facebook. Andrea stays on point with these values. That appears to difficult for some (most often white liberals) to handle. Is it because she is a woman with convictions? Yes. Is it because she is a Latina speaking truth? Yes. Quite frankly, I don't think they are ready for this party if they can't reflect on this sort of feedback and move towards the vision outlined in the platform. If these are the people the party is seeking to work with, I won't be around long. I'm not interested in being part of Dems 2.0.
I'd first like to clarify the purpose of this proposal. The stated purpose – “call for election of both state Co Chair positions” – actually isn't possible, because we have an active co chair and regular elections won't be held till the Annual Meeting next year. If this is intended to be a recall proposal to remove Andrea from her position, it would require a vote of 75%, not the 60% listed in this proposal. Please reference the bylaws, section 5.9: “If any officer or national representative is found to be in contempt of the goals of the Green Party of Colorado, recall proceedings shall be invoked. A three fourths majority of voting members present at a state meeting and/or the Council is required to achieve the recall of an officer.” Section 4.3, which is referenced in the proposal, actually doesn't apply to this situation, since this is not a vote on policy, finance, or objectives, and this is not a state meeting where we would have regular elections.This proposal appears to be out of order. Can the sponsors or the facilitator clarify, please? If it is a recall, the title and text of the proposal should be updated to reference the recall and the 75% threshold.In case this is in fact a recall proposal, I vote Disagree. In my mind, Andrea has done nothing to show contempt for the goals of the state party, and has in fact been directly responsible for a great deal of the growth and level of organization we have achieved over the last few months. Aside from the multiple new chapters she has directly rebooted or started (including my own in Arapahoe that is currently mostly made up of former berners), we've seen our registrations statewide up by 50% and we are engaging with frontline communities at a much higher level than before she became co-chair. I see nothing in any of the items listed in the proposal that suggests Andrea has done anything that would violate any of our key values.
Sean, when I asked for clarification when posting this proposal by the sponsors, I was told it is not a recall proposal, which is why I didn't reference Section 5.9 of the Bylaws. I referenced 4.3 because, since this is not a recall proposal, it was the next best fit. Any other clarification will have to come from the sponsors of the proposal. If you think you can do a better job as facilitator, be my guest.
I wasn't trying to imply anything about your job as facilitator, just looking for clarification on what the exact nature and intent of this proposal was. That said, if this isn't a recall proposal, it should be retracted or significantly reworked by the sponsors. You can't call for elections for a position that is already filled. Andrea has not resigned from her position and cannot be removed except by recall. If a recall proposal were submitted and passed by 75%, then a call for nominations and elections would be appropriate. We need to follow our bylaws, especially with something as important as this.
DisagreeIn my experience, Andrea Mérida Cuéllar has been an invaluable asset as a leader of the State Party. While some locals were clamoring to support the candidacy of Bernie Sanders, Andrea was working to build a strong base to support The Green Party Presidential Candidate. In regards to Arn feeling unsupported, I'm not certain that he understands that that effort by default, trickled down into his campaign by facilitating well attended campaign events where Arn was given a platform to speak to many voters at once. Andrea is a strong and highly effective leader, and we (Poudre Valley) would not be as strong as we are without her. She has helped us rebuild a local that was effectively dead by providing us with physical, intellectual, and historical resources, on a moments notice. She has driven up here to help us with events and participated in a few of our early reboot meetings. Furthermore, I see the statement that you're citing as cause to remove Andrea from her post as one of the reasons that she is so effective. It actually proves that she is able to discern between a person that is moving to the Green Party to help us grow as opposed to a person who is moving to the party to protest DNC politics. There is a huge difference between these two types of people and it is important for our leadership to recognize that. In order to remake the society that we live in, we have got to get to work building an intersectional space where radical change can occur.I believe that this proposal is lodged as retaliation for the recall against Bill. I would like to point out that that recall was proposed by Poudre Valley (Bill's local before Platte Valley was affiliated 2 weeks ago) and Arapahoe County, not Andrea. Worse, that you would try to conflate Nation Builder expenses and spending $50 on a hotspot so that we could raise more than $2,000 for our Presidential Candidate with referring to women as 'girls' and claiming that anti-white racism is real, is repulsive and inexcusable. Building this party is Andrea's job and that is exactly what she is doing. She is traveling the state and organizing at every level to make the Green Party a viable political organization for all people suffering under the boot of capitalism. I applaud Andrea for her strength and grace in the face of nearly constant adversity. Thank you for all you do Andrea Mérida Cuéllar.To echo Sean's question, I wonder why the people who wrote this proposal chose to side step an actual recall vote?
DisagreeAndrea has been extremely supportive to me and the Green Party of the Pikes Peak Region, which has also welcomed former Berners. As a woman of color, I personally believe that she is a breath of fresh air and more than qualified to lead the state party. I am glad that our party is finally becoming more inclusive and is actively supporting our most vulnerable communities. As far as the Facebook comments, I share her concerns that SOME former Berners may not be fully aligned with our 10 Key Values. This stems from several interactions where they have criticized Ajamu Baraka's past commentary on white supremacy, racist foreign policy, etc., and argued that he needs to "tone down his language" when it's really not up to them to tell the black community what language they should use to liberate themselves or to chastise them for their outrage when they have the right to be outraged. If racial justice is going to be a pillar of the Green Party platform, we need to ensure that we walk the walk and stand by our principles and that is why we had concerns that SOME former Dems might attempt to deradicalize us in an effort to make the Green Party "more viable" and "acceptable" to mainstream audiences (yes, some have suggested this). This does not mean that we should be unwelcoming, but rather, that we make sure that all members understand that our party is serious about challenging white supremacy, capitalism, patriarchy, etc. Once again, this is not a generalization of all former Berners, but it is something that we need to address and discuss post-election. It IS possible to have these conversations while being 100% welcoming to those who share our values (we do it here in the Springs). Again, I disagree with the proposal and look forward to having a state-wide discussion with you all after November 8th.
AGREE First of all this proposal is not erroneous and doesn't need to be retracted or reworked. Council members can propose anything they wish in a proposal from endorsements to bylaws changes and submit it to the state council for agreement seeking/voting. Of course this is about both policy and objectives. The proposal to remove Bill from office was called "Proposal to fill co chair vacancy" even though Bill hadn't been removed and hadn't resigned. This is a blatant double standard.Proposal 07-16 was an attempt to heal a serious divide in the party by having interim co chairs who were not involved in the recent ugliness step in and transcend it in order to focus on the other more important issues like our candidates and A-69. The hypocrisy and double standards in some of these posts is staggering. This post by Ms. Garcia-Lock is unbelievable "We are all adults, why are we wasting time focusing on this when we have so many other things to worry about? When you go to work and don't like a co-worker or your boss do you campaign to get them fired? NO. Leave it at the door." Really?? Is this the approach that was taken with Bill Barlett? And as Bob Kinsey said today this entire episode starting with the proposal to remove Bill couldn't have waited until November 9th?Mr. Justice. How dare you accuse the sponsors of this proposal of being white-privileged racists. I have been active in the GPCO and I have promoted the 10 key values for 10 years and I certainly don't need your validation. Donald Trump and David Duke are racists. The fact that you and others use the race card as a weapon against anyone who disagrees with you is despicable and you sir are awash in shame for using such a serious issue as a tool to achieve your nefarious goals. Your hypocrisy is stunning. Isn't racism at it's core about associating certain stereotypes and behaviors with an entire group of people or ethnic group? Yet it's OK for you to throw around terms like white-privileged, racist, and sexist about people you've never met or spoken with. You do a great disservice to your cause. And no one volunteers their time and energy to promote the Green Party and the 10KV as an "academic exercise" as Andrea has implied again assuming the motives of people because they happen to be Caucasian. And as far as scurrilous lies are concerned you once again accuse Bill of something he didn't do. All of you who have jumped on this band wagon shame on you. Bill was asked if he threatened Andrea and he disputed the claim. You say you stepped in front of him before he had a chance to take a swing at Andrea. You could say that about anyone who was within three feet of her. How convenient that the main argument for removing Bill was an incident that can't be proven and is your word against his. The version that Bill related to me was that he was trying to help you take items to your car and talk to you but you were both hostile to him and he said that was f'ed up. I have known Bill for many years. I don't know you. Someone is lying. So I can only conclude you are lying. Anyone who wasn't there has no right to assume you are telling the truth and Bill is lying. And as far as the conference call is concerned anyone who actually listens to it will hear that Bill and Andrea were both talking over each other as can happen in an intense conversation. There was an obvious lull where she had an opportunity to speak but she conveniently hung up so she didn't have to actually address the issue. For anyone to assert that Bill used "violent language" is absurd. So here we are bickering like spoiled brats at this critical time. So much for trying to heal a wound and bridge the divide and pursue conflict resolution. It's time to get this out in the open.Andrea Merida Cuellar is attempting to take control of the Green Party of Colorado. She has demonstrated a pattern of starting local chapters and hand picking state council reps who are in lock step with her. You only need to look at the history of the way the chapters she has created have voted. And she has also demonstrated time and time again a pattern of retaliating against people who disagree with her with hostile communications and accusations in emails, Facebook posts, and in social media. And this is undoubtedly why there was a proposal to remove Bill. Do the people who backed that proposal really expect us to believe that she wasn't pulling the strings behind the scenes? Nothing goes on in the GPCO without her involvement. Do you really think we can't see through the good cop/bad cop nonsense where she keeps her nose clean but sends out the attack dogs to do the dirty work? Please! Her M O is obvious. Create a power base and stack the deck against anyone and any local chapters that aren't in lock step. If she creates enough of a power base she can exercise total control of the party by means of a majority of people in her camp on the state council. Deny it. Many former Bernie supporters and disgruntled Democrats have reached out to me about her hostility towards them and have related similar stories from other people they know. I'm sure every local is experiencing an influx of Berners and former Dems as is the Greater Boulder chapter. But the many examples of her propensity to alienate many of them is inexcusable. This is the greatest opportunity for growth the GPCO has ever seen and to alienate even one potentially active Green is incomprehensible! Our Green registration numbers are up despite her not because of her. Every Colorado Green should be suspicious of Andrea's motives. Why did the proposal to remove Bill surface when it did (don't deny she was behind it). It has completely distracted the entire party from the elections. Why did she stifle the proposal to endorse A-69 when many chapters supported it as well as our amazing U.S. Senate candidate, Arn Menconi, and our presidential candidate Jill Stein? Why has she chosen to pick fights with Arn rather than find some kind of common ground? Why have council members from Boulder including our co chair Carolyn Bninski and council members from the Jeffco Greens not been been able to get access to the Forum? Why have many new members been added to the state council without notifying our council facilitator Brittany Hoover? People have been voting without even an indication of what local they belong to which should disqualify their vote. Why did Andrea single-handedly redesign the state web site with no input from the web site committee or co chair? Why are the two domain names the GPCO owns on her private server and not on a state account accessible to the web site committee? Wake up people. Anyone who tries to exercise control over a political party is toxic to that party. The position of co chair is not a position of authority and no one who serves in that position has a right to act unilaterally on any issue. The GPCO is in a state of total disfunction at this time and this will not change as long as Andrea is co chair. If she cares about the GPCO more than her own agenda she will step down like Bill did so that we can function as a political party instead of bunch of spoiled brats.Kevin Alumbaugh
DISAGREE. I am new, but Andrea has been great to work with and is doing a great job. We shouldn't make more work than we need. I do agree we need to fill the vacant spot, so why not just do a re-election for only the vacant spot?
Disagree.I have been so pleased with Andrea's work in her role that I personally feel that losing her even for a short time would be a huge hinderance for us, a disservice to her personally and a repudiation of all the amazing work she has been doing for the party.
I wanted to address some of the allegations in the proposal, for everyone's information. I apologize that this post will be quite long.WEBSITEIn 2014, the members of the website committee consisted of Bill, Harry Hempy and myself. Harry resigned to run for governor, and the committee was only Bill and myself. Keep in mind that I was not state co-chair then, and the responsibility of appointing new members was Bill's, not mine.In 2015, Bill and I discussed moving the website to his hosting company and also tranferring the ownership of the domain "coloradogreenparty.org." The website up to that point was being paid for by Kevin Alumbaugh's wife, Liz Hamilton, as an unrecorded in-kind donation. Because we were not able to add email accounts and otherwise manage the website because we didn't have access to all the website controls, we decided to ask Liz to transfer ownership of the domain. Also, since the hosting was going to be more than $100 a month, Bill and I agreed that that expense was too high, especially since both he and I have our own shared hosting spaces where we could host for free for the time being.Bill and I discussed a few ideas, like setting up a shared hosting site where locals could have their hosting space together, splitting up the cost cooperatively. We decided that Bill should host the website on his hosting space. The first step was to ask Liz to transfer ownership of the domain.After weeks of waiting for Bill to ask, I went ahead and asked Liz myself, but I asked her to transfer it directly to Bill, not to me. See the attached file "GPCO domain transfer" for those details.Bill was still unresponsive, and I finally asked her to transfer the domain to me. That's why it's presently registered to me.Bill was supposed to set up a hosting space on his own server for the website. He attempted to do so, but apparently it was not done correctly, and a crisis situation emerged, because the state party website was now down over an election weekend, and Bill had gone out of town and was incommunicado.To rectify the situation, I went ahead and rebuilt the website on my hosting account, and that's where it still resides today. You can see documentation of that situation in the two attachments called "GPCO Website Login info."Understand that at no point did I make any unilateral decisions, and at no point was Bill not apprised of the situation.HOTSPOTBecause the Mercury Cafe in Denver does not have WiFi, and because we had to process donations through Jill's website, keeping in mind compliance directives from her campaign, I decided to get a mobile WiFi hotspot from Boost Mobile. The cost for the device itself was $125, which I paid for, and the data plan for it was $50 a month. The state party paid $50 only for one month's service. I have continued to pay for subsequent months of service, though I have been using it for state party business where needed. As Dave Bell pointed out in a previous post, we raised more than $2000 for the campaign because we were able to be connected to the internet.Below is a link to a screen shot of the banking transactions for the last 90 days so that you can see there was only one charge of $50 since getting the device in July.https://drive.google.com/open?id=0ByNZ1Gqvs9d5Y0V3cEV2QjMtbDgNATIONBUILDERLaura Clark had been paying for Nationbuilder for over a year at a rate of $28 a month. Bill had done some initial work, uploading a portion of the voter database for Greeley. Keep in mind that this account was launched before I became co-chair in May 2015. But Laura was paying for a database that was not being used.Laura decided she was no longer going to pay for the account personally, and so the billing was transferred to the state party. You all voted to approve the expenditure of $28 a month at the state meeting in May 2015, and a couple of you pledged to help pay for it, though those pledges have never materialized.Later, after I became co-chair, Bill and I agreed to expand the capabilities of Nationbuilder so that we could send out more email blasts, robocalls and text blasts. Keep in mind also that Nationbuilder's cost expands with the number of records in your database, and we're approaching 15k contacts, and that we currently have more than 12, 000 registered Greens as of now. That cost is now $108 a month, and with the expanded features, we have reached a few thousand Greens, created phone banking lists that many of you have used, including Boulder, Mesa, Denver and Poudre. We have used the robocall and text blast capabilities to announce Jill's event in Boulder; to announce chapter meetings and launches for Pueblo, Platte Valley, Mesa, Avon, Longmont, Adams, Pikes Peak and Denver.We have to pay separately to run the robocalls, but it's always less than $10 per shot. It's an infinitely cheaper way than even postcards to reach many, many voters in one fell swoop, and it helps party activists stretch out their time to focus on other things.Below is a screen shot from Nationbuilder that shows the cost and some of the features. The cost of Nationbuilder is currently being supported by donations.https://drive.google.com/open?id=0ByNZ1Gqvs9d5aHFjUnhodzNNMFEGoing forward, my recommendation will be for us to pay up front for a whole year of service, which will reduce our cost to $70.20 a month. Keep your eyes peeled for that proposal, because the bylaws only permit co-chairs to spend less than $200 a month without council approval.OTHER ISSUESThere seem to be quite a bit of distress around my personal opinion about finding the right prospects for partybuilding from among Sanders supporters. But just as Michael Haughey is apparently free to openly advocate for Green nomination of Bernie Sanders as late as the People's Fair in June (and within the Jeffco meetings), then I too can have an opinion about who really is the right prospect for us. Each of us have our own opinion, and I am entitled to mine as you are to yours. I have never offered that my opinion is the state party position, however.Additionally, I want to call out the elephant in the room, and that's the distress over my personal opinion, which I have shared with many of you, about Amendment 69. I am on the record as personally being opposed. That is offensive to some of you. However, I have never represented my personal opinion as the state opinion, I have never blocked any proposal brought forward, nor have I ever coerced anyone to take on my opinion. Of note is that many of the people who disagree with this proposal are actually Amendment 69 supporters...and even more to the point, the co-sponsors of the previous recall petition include a chapter that has voted to endorse 69.It would appear that some of you have vastly different opinions than me on at least a couple different material issues. I have not slandered any of you over it, however.RACISMThere is an updated sociological definition of racism, that goes beyond an anthropological human trait or simple feelings or speech that is bigoted. Instead, racial justice activists recognize that RACISM = BIGOTRY + POWER. It's easier to understand it as "institutional racism." Here's an older article with some insight on this. http://everydayfeminism.com/2013/08/racist-against-white-people/People who use bigoted speech are therefore not racists if they are people of color. Their speech cannot be used to curtail a white person's rights or access to jobs or positions. It is entirely possible for a person of color to be bigoted, however.It is time to update our definition of what racism actually is and to begin to scrutinize whether we are creating a welcoming space for people of color (and all other oppressed communities) to come and build up electoral and movement power together in the Green Party. I can tell you that we don't have that yet. The hue and cry over my controversial (to some) opinions, which are not binding, is just an indicator. The fact that Kevin has assigned me superhuman mastermind powers over intelligent, free-thinking (largely white) individuals, without considering that they are actively anti-racist in their own right, is another. Yet another is the failure of the proposal proponents to afford me any due process at all.It is very easy to uphold white supremacy, even as a person of color. There is more information on that here, and I invite you all to read and absorb. http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/10-things-everyone-should-know-about-white-supremacySeveral of us in the party are working on some workshops for our party that everyone will be invited to participate. I hope that everyone on the state council takes the time to open their minds and learn a bit more about how to open up our party.IN CLOSINGAt the end of the day, you all need to hear that I am not going to resign, and except for issues with health or work, I intend to run for reelection. So that means that we're in this together, at least for several more months. It is true that I am a religious person; I am a practicing Roman Catholic, and that means that forgiveness is my mandate. What that means to you is that you will continue to be treated with respect, if not always docility. There is excellent roundabout critique here, and in response, my further commitment to you is that you will get more communication about the way things are happening, regardless of my wish to help others save face, and that you will get copies of bank statements posted here with explanation of expenditures, whether we have a treasurer or not. I will take on that responsibility.We're in this together, folks. Let's try to make the best of it. You are right that we have an opportunity to bring on more members, and I intent to keep recruiting the best options from the former Sanders supporters, as well as continuing to bring on more and more recruits from oppressed communities. I continue to work hard fulfilling YOUR mandate from when I was elected co-chair, which was to build this into an electoral party and run candidates.What's your commitment to this process?Solidarity,Andrea Merida CuellarCo-Chair
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