Assembly Information
Thursday, February 21st, 2008, 5:23 AM
During the course of this campaign, I have often quoted humorist Will Rogers, who said seventy years ago that "I am not a member of any organized political party. I am a Democrat." I believe that knowledge of the rules and organization of the County Assembly will help to ensure that the process fairly reflects the preferences of those who attend and vote.
I feel strongly that the process must be understandable in order to be fair to everyone.
Many delegates and alternates are new this year to the caucus, convention, and assembly process. On caucus night, seasoned political insiders in a number of precincts were able to do things that left some participants--particularly newcomers to the process--wondering what had happened. A few people even felt hoodwinked.
At this time, I have been told that the Democratic Party will not provide training to delegates and alternates. For this reason, I am providing you with information regarding the County Assembly agenda, rules, and procedures. Please reply to this email or call me at 720-216-0416 if you have any questions, and I will do my best to provide accurate and timely answers to you.
Please also visit my campaign web site at voteTomRussell.com
THE ASSEMBLY
With regard to House District 6 race, the County Assembly is only one of the steps in the process of selecting the candidates who will appear on the August primary ballot. The Assembly is not the final step. The selection and ranking of candidates takes place at the Multi-County Assembly, which will take place one week after the County Assembly.
You are a delegate or alternate to the County Assembly, which will take place on March 8th from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Colorado Convention Center (14th St. & Champa.) The Assembly will meet in the Wells Fargo Theater inside the Convention Center.
The County Assembly takes place at the same time and place as the County Convention. The Convention deals with the presidential race and selects delegates who move on (or up) to other conventions. The Assembly, by contrast, considers other issues and races including the House District 6 race. In about half of the precincts, the same people serve as the precinct’s delegates to the Convention and to the Assembly, so you may be a delegate or alternate to both the Convention and the Assembly.
The County Assembly accomplishes several tasks. There will be delegates from all over Denver County including several different House Districts. Delegates will nominate a candidate or candidates for District Attorney; elect delegates to the 1st Congressional District Assembly/Convention; elect delegates to the State Assembly/Convention; and approve a county party platform. After dealing with the county platform and the D.A. race, the County Assembly will separate into House Districts. The House District 6 delegates will vote in a preference poll much as you did for the presidential candidates at your precinct caucus. This preference poll will allocate the delegates who will move on to the next step.
The next step in picking the Democratic candidates for the August primary ballot is the Multi-County Assembly, which will take place on March 15. Because House District 6 also includes two Arapahoe County precincts (Glendale), House District 6 candidates will be nominated at a Multi-County Assembly that will include delegates from the 2 Arapahoe precincts and the 66 Denver precincts.
The Democratic Party has determined that there will be a total of 180 delegates from House District 6 for the Multi-County Assembly. The preference poll at the County Assembly will determine how many delegates each candidate will have at the Multi-County Assembly.
Here is an example of the process. If all the delegates from every precinct attend the County Assembly on March 8, there will be 499 House District 6 delegates. Let's say that 50% or 250 of the delegates vote for me in the preference poll, with other votes distributed among the other candidates. The next step will be to divide the 180 delegates who move on to the Multi-County Assembly. In this example, ninety delegates (50%) would be allocated to me. The final step will be to select the 90 people who will serve as delegates from among the 250 people who voted for me in the preference poll. Those 90 delegates will move on to the Multi-County Assembly.
Problems sometimes arise when delegates selected to move on to the Multi-County Assembly discover that they cannot attend this second assembly. The Multi-County Assembly will take place on March 15 from 8 to 11 a.m. at 777 Peoria St. in Aurora. Please check your schedule for March 15 before you attend the County Assembly. If you cannot attend the second assembly, then you should vote in the preference poll at the County Assembly but let someone else serve as a delegate to the Multi-County Assembly.
At the Multi-County Assembly, delegates will actually vote on which candidates get onto the primary ballot. That process is sufficiently complicated that I will explain it in a subsequent newsletter.
Groundhog Day
Sunday, February 3rd, 2008, 10:52 PM
Saturday was Groundhog Day. At Health Care for All Colorado's monthly meeting, I told a little story about what Groundhog Day means in my family. I grew up in Pittsburgh about 80 miles from Punxsutawney, the town where a groundhog's shadow signals when winter will end. However, the reason that my family and I celebrate with cupcakes on Groundhog Day is because it's the day that my daughter came home from the hospital.
Ten years ago on Groundhog Day, my daughter left the hospital after 74 days in the NICU. It was a drizzly day so when she emerged from the hospital, she did not see her shadow, and we knew that our long winter was over. She had been born 14 weeks early and weighed only 2 pounds 4.1 ounces. For my wife, son, and I, this was our first intense, long-term experience with hospitalization. At the start of the ordeal, my dad said to me that it would be a "maturing experience." And how! Today, I'm happy to say my daughter's great.
The entire experience--from when my wife went into the hospital in early labor to when my daughter left the hospital--cost us, I believe, a co-pay of $100. Today, I believe that the same experience might easily bankrupt us. During the last decade, the cost of medical care has increased more quickly than other costs we face. At the same time, our health insurance covers less and less. These are some of the reasons that one-half of all personal bankruptcies today have an origin in illness or injury.
Like the members of Health Care for All Colorado, I advocate a single-payer solution to the problem of health care in Colorado. A single-payer solution would provide universal health care while reducing costs and preserving choices. I am disappointed that the 208 Commission has recommended patches and mandates of the existing health insurance system. I saw Rep. Claire Levy (D-Boulder) just behind the old Supreme Court chamber as the 208 Commission was getting set to issue its recommendation on Thursday. Rep. Levy is trying to introduce a single-payer bill this session, and I told her that if she is not able to introduce the bill or if the bill makes no headway this year, then if elected, I will gladly co-sponsor the bill or introduce it myself in 2009.
Where's my caucus?
Wednesday, January 16th, 2008, 11:23 AM
Many people have asked: where is my caucus? Also, as I campaign from door to door, I am discovering that many Democratic voters in District 6 do not yet know the location of their caucus.
To solve this problem, I created a Caucus Finder on my campaign web site. For any address within District 6, the caucus finder is a nice little tool that that returns precinct number, caucus address, a map (or link to a map), and the time and date for the caucus. (February 5 at 7 p.m. but it’s best to arrive early!)
See: http://www.votetomrussell.com/info_for_voters.html
Please help to get District 6 Democratic voters to their caucuses by forwarding this link to your neighbors and friends in District 6?
(For Denver Democratic voters outside of District 6, see http://www.denverdemocrats.org/ for a two-step process for finding the location of a caucus. My caucus finder only has data for District 6. Voters in other Colorado counties should contact their county's Democratic Party in order to find their caucus location.)