2023 Green Party of PA goals
2023 GPPA Goals
[Drafted by GPPA Co-chair Jay Walker for the GPPA State Meeting on 11/13/22. It was discussed and passed by the delegates. It still needs a GPPA GROWTH COMMITTEE to follow through with implementation.]
County parties are our cornerstone. They support our petitioning efforts, our candidates, and our local actions.
We need to make sure it's easy to run one and that there's lots of guidance. I want everyone to ask themselves, “is this thing I'm doing for the party helping to build my county chapter?”
Overall Goals
- 10 well functioning county parties
- $20,000 raised to hire ballot access coordinator in 2024
- 7500 signatures gathered around the state
- 300 Greens registered
- 12 Greenstars
County Party Goals each with at least
- 4 meetings (Quarterly)
- 1 local candidate
- 5 heavily involved members
- 10 active members
- 500 signatures gathered
- 3 GPPA State Committee watch parties
- 1 2024 state house candidate identified in each county
- 100% GPPA state committee delegation
- 4 direct actions participated in
Team Goals
- 1 meeting per month
- 2 Co-leader, and vice leader
Communications Team
- 12 Greenstar a month
- 24 news releases
- 1 updated media contact database
Core Team
- 10 mailing lists for county parties
- 36 scheduled emails for county party meetings
- 30 Greens trains on NationBuilder
- 12 phonebanks for turnout to events (monthly)
- 1 updated 2023 Delegate/Officer spreadsheet
- 2 Agenda/Facilitator/Notetaker training
- 1 onboarding system developed
- 1000 disconnected registered Greens reached out to
Finance Team
- 200 dues paid members
- 2 in-person fundraisers
- 6 phonebanks to Greens to get them to become dues payers
- 1 report to Department of State
Greenwave Team
- 1 campaign training
- 4 candidate phonebanks
Green Party of PA
- 1 Green Party of PA Black caucus
- 4 regional meetings
- 90% of state committee delegates on slack
- Competitive 2024 Green Party of PA internal elections
Police Brutality, White Supremacy and Reparations
[email protected]
Police Brutality, White Supremacy and Reparations
Global Day of Protest on January 25
PA Greens endorse Divest from the War Machine
Green Party of Pennsylvania
www.gpofpa.org
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 17, 2019
Contact:
Alan Smith, [email protected]
Chris Robinson, 215-843-4256, [email protected]
The Green Party of Pennsylvania (GPPA) Steering Committee has endorsed and joined the new coalition, Divest from the War Machine. The purpose of Divest from the War Machine is "removing invested assets from companies that derive their profits from U.S. military interventions, the global arms trade, and the militarization of our streets."
Alan Smith, co-chair of GPPA from Chester County, explained, "A year to the day before he was killed, April 4, 1967, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his "Beyond Vietnam" speech. On the anniversary of that speech, Code Pink and the Black Alliance for Peace with Ajamu Baraka, 2016 Green Party nominee for vice president, co-sponsored the new coalition, Divest from the War Machine."
"In his speech," continued Smith, "King railed against racism, materialism and militarism calling for a revolution of values. The U.S. is heavily invested in these three things which oil the war machine. War and violence are used to protect the property of the ruling class and perpetuate their interests. The Pentagon budget is $1 trillion. The U.S. is the number one arms trader on the planet. The U.S. has over 1,000 military bases occupying 160 out of the 196 countries. Corporate and financial institutions are heavily invested in racism, materialism and militarism. Democrats and Republicans, including the Trump administration, all support the expansion of the military. A commitment to people, planet and peace is at the heart of the Green Party. We stand against racism, materialism and materialism. We must divest financially, intellectually, culturally, and emotionally from those things that run the war machine. No more oil for the war machine!"
The Divest from the War Machine coalition says, "We are demanding that our universities, religious organizations, individual investors, retirement funds, mutual funds, and other financial institutions stop making a killing on killing."
Chris Robinson, a GPPA delegate from Philadelphia, offered some background, "There is a rejuvenation of the peace movement taking place through new coalitions like Divest from the War Machine and Black Alliance for Peace. These organizations give Green Party members a chance to live the Green Party platform. One of the Green Party's four pillars is 'peace.' I plan to work closely with Divest Philly from the War Machine to demonstrate how the Green Party differs from the war parties."
The Green Party is an independent political party that stands in opposition to the two corporate parties. GPPA candidates promote public policy based on the Green Party four pillars: grassroots democracy, nonviolence, ecological wisdom, and social justice/equal opportunity. For further information about GPPA, please visit www.gpofpa.org. Follow GPPA on social media: Facebook and Twitter.
*** END ITEM ***
Wolf's Plan Won't Restore Pennsylvania
PA Greens call H.R. 1, “Onerous and Deceptive”
February 11, 2019
1 (H.R.1) that would work to vilify or weaken progressive voices, and we are against the proposed changes for the federal matching funds program,” stated Jocolyn Bowser-Bostick, chair of the Delaware County Green Party and member of the GPPA Steering Committee.
justice/equal opportunity. For further information about GPPA, please visitwww.gpofpa.org. Follow GPPA on social media: Facebook, Green Party of Pennsylvania and Twitter, @GreenPartyofPA.
Green Party Requests UN to Takeover Fukushima Reactors
In December 2018, the Green Party of Pennsylvania (GPPA) requested the United Nations to take over the crippled nuclear reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station (Fuku) in Japan. Acting in response to a request by GPPA, the National Committee of Green Party of United States (GPUS) has adopted a proposal requesting similar actions. The GPUS proposal contains an Open Letter to the United Nations to direct the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to take over the Japanese nuclear reactors. In addition, the GPUS requests the International Olympic Committed to transfer the 2020 Games away from Japan. [Here’s the proposal adopted by GPUS: http://www.gp.org/fukushima_daiichi]
Involvement by the GPPA was initiated by Tom Bailey, a Green Party member from Westmoreland County. Bailey had been a student at Elizabethtown College in 1979 and was evacuated from campus during the meltdown of the nearby nuclear reactor at Three Mile Island. Since then, Bailey, now a father of three, has been concerned about the effects of the accidental release of radiation on future generations and sees the Fukushima accident and continued contamination as a serious threat. “The Japanese government has dumped one hundred tons of fresh water into each reactor daily,” explained Bailey. “These tons of water sink through the former Fuku reactors’ floors, join the ground water below and seep into the Pacific Ocean only yards away. Dumping radioactive waste into the ocean is illegal, and its effect on the global food chain will be devastating to all life on Earth for generations.”
Therefore, GPPA has requested that the UN take action, including a new UN General Assembly resolution which would authorize the IAEA to “physically occupy nuclear facilities” when the situation there is “out of control.”
Sheri Miller, chair of GPPA, agrees with the letter’s emphasis on this generation’s accountability. "The adults alive today must take responsibility to care for radioactive materials for what could be thousands of years. Because our generation consumed the electricity, our generation must be responsible for what we benefited from. We [should not] selfishly burden future generations.”
At the time of the Fuku disaster in 2011, the GPPA Steering Committee called for the closing and decommissioning of PA's five nuclear power plants, which contain nine operating nuclear reactors. Then GPPA Chair Ian K. Samways from Allegheny County explained, "The Fukushima nuclear power plant catastrophe in Japan is a wakeup call that this energy source is neither safe nor sustainable. The entire nuclear-power life cycle is fraught with inherent risk, which is multiplied by the possibility of human error." [See: https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/nwgreens/conversations/messages/8457]
Neal Gale, the GPPA candidate for U.S. Senate, said recently, “During the six decades that nuclear reactors have been used to generate electric power -- the first coming on-line in Shippingport, PA, in 1957 -- proponents have claimed safe and efficient operations providing inexpensive power for unlimited economic growth. The truth is something else!”
Gale then checked off the many ills of nuclear power, “multiple system breakdowns in plants around the world leading to regional contamination zones; costs per kWh surpassing other generation fuel sources; tons of waste plutonium, unable to be safely stored, with a toxic half-life of 36 thousand years; disregard for the health of the (often indigenous) workers who mine the radioactive ore for use in the plants; and the inevitable link between the ‘waste’ product of the reactors – plutonium – and the use of that plutonium in the manufacture of nuclear armaments. We can no longer accept the multiple risks presented by this economically centralized, environmentally hazardous and technically unresolved energy source. Each nuclear plant represents not only an accident of potentially horrendous consequences waiting to happen, but a continuation of an energy strategy designed to maximize the profits of the financial elite at the expense of the rest of us. We have better, renewable choices!”
The GPUS sent its revised Open Letter and its Background with Endnotes to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on December 18. In 2017, the United Nations Human Rights Council found the Japanese Government had violated the human rights of residents of Japan. It ordered a reduced level of radiation exposure must be achieved for these residents. The Green Party requested that these radiation reduction levels must be achieved before the 2020 Summer Olympic Games are opened. Charging that Japan is violating the Olympic Mission, the Green Party has requested the IOC perform an inquiry to protect the residents of Japan, possible [2020 Summer] Olympians and the Pacific Ocean from unnecessary nuclear radiation.
GPUS has yet to deliver its Open Letter to the United Nations.
The Green Party is an independent political party that stands in opposition to the two corporate parties. GPPA candidates promote public policy based on the Green Party four pillars: grassroots democracy, nonviolence, ecological wisdom, and social justice/equal opportunity. For further information about GPPA, please visit www.gpofpa.org. Follow GPPA on social media: Facebook, Green Party of Pennsylvania and Twitter, @GreenPartyofPA.
PA Greens Condemn Recent Hate Attacks
This has been a horrendous week of hate: Beginning with the Administration’s efforts to persecute and threaten the lives of millions of transgender people through a change in the official definition of gender, and ending with the unspeakable, anti-semitic tragedy in Pittsburgh.
Green Party of Pennsylvania members extend our deepest sympathies and offer our support to the victims of these acts of violence. These unspeakable anti-semitic, cissexist, bigoted attacks are a tragic indignity to our American values. We stand in solidarity with the Tree of Life Synagogue, the trans community, and the victims of these horrific hate crimes.
The Green Party of Pennsylvania denounces all hate crime and bigotry, whether expressed through physical violence such as Saturday’s tragedy, or through policy by systematic legislation that destroys people’s lives in other ways. We encourage tolerance, acceptance and humanism among all people.
We must work to end all forms of violence at home, in our communities, in government, and around the world. At this time of so much radicalization, heartbreak, grief, and fear for so many, we encourage all people to stand with vulnerable and persecuted populations and victims of hate.
Green Party of PA Applauds the PA League of Women Voters' Withdrawal from the Debates
On October 12th, the League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania (LWV PA) announced the withdrawal of their co-sponsorship of the 2018 Pennsylvania Senate Debate to be held on October 20, 2018 at WPVI-TV studios in Philadelphia.
The LWV PA statement read:
“LWV PA has partnered with WPVI for many years to provide candidate debates to voters in the Philadelphia viewing area. We value this partnership and we respect WPVI’s right to set their own criteria for candidate debates. However, LWV PA has always been a nonpartisan resource for voters and we value the trust that the public places in us to provide accurate, unbiased information so that they can make informed decisions on Election Day. When the terms for this debate were first negotiated between LWV PA and WPVI, the rules for ballot access were different; since then, a federal settlement has allowed third parties greater access to the ballot, and LWV PA amended our criteria for inclusion in our debates to reflect that. Therefore, we will not participate in debates that do not invite all balloted candidates.”
The Green Party of Pennsylvania (GPPA) applauds the LWV PA decision. By their withdrawal, the LWV PA demonstrates their commitment to providing the Commonwealth with unbiased information that is necessary for an informed electorate to select its representatives through fair and free elections.
The GPPA has tirelessly fought the bureaucratic barriers of the Commonwealth which function as the means to silence the wide range of political views shared by its citizens. With our allies in democracy, the Libertarian Party of Pennsylvania and Constitution Party of Pennsylvania, the GPPA has successfully achieved a reduction in exorbitant requirements for minor political parties to gain access to the electoral ballot. We now face obstruction from media outlets and pollsters who create arbitrary requirements for inclusion in polls, reporting, or debates.
In order to ensure an informed and engaged electorate in the Commonwealth it is critical for organizations like the LWV PA to make bold statements such as their withdrawal from this debate. We appreciate the LWV PA’s steadfast commitment to democracy and encourage others to follow their lead.
Green Party of Pennsylvania Strongly Opposes PA SB652
The Environmental Resources and Energy Committee of the Pennsylvania House will vote tomorrow, September 25th, on SB652, which institutes severe penalties for protesting (or even supporting a protest online) of “critical infrastructure” properties, including pipelines. This bill has already passed in the Pennsylvania Senate.
The Green Party of Pennsylvania joins the Pennsylvania Sierra Club and the Pennsylvania ACLU in voicing strong opposition to SB652. This bill creates a new category that classifies 21 different types of facilities as “critical infrastructure” facilities and imposes severe penalties for anyone who enters or attempts to enter the property or “conspires with another person to commit a prohibited act.” A first offense would result in a felony offense which would be punishable by up to a year in jail and a fine of not less than $5,000.
Some of the properties classified as critical infrastructure facilities include dams, refineries, manufacturing plants, power plants, truck terminals, and pipelines. Pipelines are counted whether they are above or below ground and at any stage of construction, or even just as an easement, prior to beginning construction. The entire bill can be downloaded here.
This bill is redundant in that there are already strict penalties for people who are convicted of trespassing or destruction of property in general. It is clear by the frequency in which pipelines are mentioned, that this bill is a blatant attempt to suppress peaceful, free-speech protests against pipelines and stifle online opposition through prosecution of supporters as co-conspirators, subjecting them to the same penalties for simply sharing information. The bill is in the same language as other ALEC bills (American Legislative Exchange Council), written for the corporations that authored it. It is not meant to protect our "critical infrastructure" but rather to protect corporate profits.
What you can do:
Contact representatives on the Environmental Resources and Energy Committee as early as possible on Tuesday morning, September 25th to let them know you oppose this bill and believe it is an attempt to take away your 1st Amendment right to speak out against pipelines. Contact information for Committee members can be found here.
Watch for results of the Committee vote and be ready to contact your legislators if the Bill moves forward to a full House vote.