Why the Central Committee elections matter...

Until I moved to San Pedro and got more involved with the County Party, I had never heard of County Central Committees. When I worked campaigns for gubernatorial candidate Dan Lungren, Bush 2000, and congressional candidate Tim Escobar in 2002 and 2004, I never once heard of the central committee structure or how they were "supposed" to be working to get out the Republican vote. I have some theories why, but I think more importantly than why past committees have been pretty much irrelevant in the campaigns I have worked over the past 10 years, I want to instill in everyone that reads this why we need stronger and more effective central committees.

I was introduced to the central committee organization in 2006 working for Michael A. Jackson's campaign. My first impression was that the central committee's purpose was to give seven people plus ex-officios a status as being the "Republican authority" of their respective district. They were supposed to meet once a month and discuss opportunities to recruit more Republicans for office. What I saw throughout Los Angeles County were a few members in each district trying to do just that; but I also noticed those that ran for central committee strictly for their own agendas. They assumed that a position on the committee meant coffers of money would open up, and that they were "entitled" to support from every Republican in their district, if not through donations at least every Republican vote in the district. What they failed to do was reach out and ask voters and locally-elected leaders HOW they could earn their support.

My biggest priority for my first term was to learn HOW to earn the support of the local leaders and learn from them how to win elections in their parts of the district. The biggest lesson I have learned is that voters do NOT want activists as legislators, so much as they want leaders that have shown action in their activism. They also want intelligent legislators who work their way up through their local councils, school boards and community organizations. If you look at the Democratic leaders who have been successful, they all came from local elections; so have most of the Republican elected legislators. So it makes sense that we need to get more active in electing more Republicans to our local offices in the district.

So long as we play the Democrats game of "non-partisan" elections, they will continue to win majorities on our city councils. No where is this more evident than in our three primary parts of the 54th Assembly District. In Long Beach, the Democratic Party has engaged in a 12-year effort to maintain an ultra-high majority. They have done this through the unions & special interest organizations, and I have to commend one of my counterparts, Sergio Carrillo, for keeping the "non-partisan" message resonating well. Not only have local Democratic candidates been able to hide behind this, they've even been able to convince Republican voters that local elections are somehow non-partisan. So let me ask a few questions about "local issues" to see if we could afford a little partisanship:

1) Do you like paying MORE property taxes or LESS property taxes?
2) Do you prefer MORE social welfare programs or LESS programs?
3) Do you prefer MORE local government regulations on small businesses, or LESS?
4) Do you prefer MORE crime (through ignoring increasing crime trends), or LESS crime by getting tougher on criminals and gangs (think City of Los Angeles vs. City of Torrance)
5) Do you prefer MORE local government spending or LESS government spending?

I hope now you can see why promoting Republican principles and values in local races is essential. But who should be taking on the responsibility to promote these by finding and supporting local Republicans throughout each district? THIS is the official mission of your local Republican Central Committee, and one that I take very seriously.

So long as I am chairman of the 54th AD Republican Central Committee, local Republicans who seek to make a difference in their city, be it Long Beach, Signal Hill, Avalon, Los Angeles, Rolling Hills Estates or Rancho Palos Verdes, will have a group of Republican leaders behind them. This is why I am running for another term on the committee; because we have work to do in 2009 & 2010.

To close, I have learned of an effort by a few candidates to divide Long Beach (& Avalon) Republicans from those in Palos Verdes & San Pedro by marginalizing the importance of a cross-district level of support. These "Greater Long Beach" candidates are missing a key component in their campaign: Support from ANY Long Beach elected Republican. Meanwhile, I am pleased to state that two of our best Long Beach Republican leaders, Long Beach Councilman Gary DeLong and LBUSD Board member Jon Meyer, have endorsed me, as well as my friend Davina Keiser, for election on June 3rd. I have received numerous other endorsements from across the district, and I have posted them at the top of the left column. Many of these leaders have expressed a desire for our central committee members to work together across the district and help each other when each local race comes up. Those I have endorsed understand this purpose, and voting for these seven will increase the strength of our committee to seek out good Republican candidates and give them the necessary volunteer and operational support to win local election.

I hope you will make sure to vote on June 3rd for myself and my six friends, and spread the word to all of your Republican friends in Long Beach, Avalon, Signal Hill, San Pedro and the Palos Verdes Peninsula. We have a lot of work to do, and a divided committee will have the same problems in 2 years that past committees did. A united committee will be able to effectively take on the unions and special interests battling to take over our local governments and our local schools.

Your vote matters on June 3rd!

2007-2008 Accomplishments & Objectives

In an earlier posting, I introduced the general purpose of the Republican Central Committee. But I'd like to do a quick run-down of the accomplishments of the current committee and the remaining objectives for this term. The current membership of this committee has done more to get involved in local elections than in recent history, and has built opportunities for the next committees to build upon.

Shortly after being sworn in at the December 2006 RPLAC meeting, we quickly got involved in the Signal Hill city council elections, particularly the campaign to elect Nancy Long, a Signal Hill activist working to get more transparancy from the current council. Thanks to efforts by this committee in both phone banking & walking precincts, we helped Nancy quickly become more competitive; Nancy was actually leading by 23 votes for the final seat prior to provisional ballot counts. Of course, this margin never holds for a Republican candidate like it does for a Democratic one. By the time the provisionals were done, Nancy had fallen short of election. After consulting with my San-Pedran raised friend Steve Baric, president of the CA Republican Lawyers Association, Nancy decided not to pursue a lengthy recount or lawsuit, and will instead hopefully run for one of the three open seats in 2009. I've saved my yard sign from her campaign, and look forward to working as soon as she files to add a Republican to the Signal Hill City Council.

In February, I had to make a decision to work with a local friend & conservative Democrat Richard (Dick) Vladovic in his election bid for the local LAUSD seat. No Republican filed for this seat, but two far-left Democrats, UTLA activist Jesus Escandon & Progressive (aka Cindy Sheehan) Neal Kleiner, had filed to challenge Vladovic. I made the decision that it was more important for Republicans to step up and have an effect on every local election, rather than have Republicans stay home & hope that local Democrats will choose the most conservative candidate. Dick Vladovic won election in May, and has been a great leader for the community. Because I worked closely to help him win election, we now have a connection that will help us in future elections. This is the "big picture" in furthering our principles and values.

In August 2007, this committee stepped up its commitment to the state party's mission of getting more involved in local races by supporting four Palos Verdes Republicans in the November elections for Rancho Palos Verdes City Council & the Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District, my former hometown & high school district, respectively. A critical mistake we made was underestimating the influence of the local teacher's union (PVFA) & the Democrat incumbents. While Republican RPV City Councilmember Steve Wolowicz received the most votes of any candidate, our Republican challenger for the 2nd seat, RPV Traffic Commissioner Paul Wright came 80 votes short of the third and final seat. Paul ran a great campaign, and has already been encouraged by many, including myself, to run in 2009. In the PVPUSD race, we were unsuccessful in defending incumbent Dave Tomblin's seat and electing challenger Paul Neights. Both candidates were ironically painted as "union candidates" by the local union activists themselves, and unlike the City of Los Angeles, Palos Verdes residents do not exactly endorse the "union label". I learned a lot by participating in these races, and am still proud to have supported all four. I am already looking forward to the opportunities for both RPV City Council and the PVPUSD board for 2009.

For Tuesday's election, I have personally been working with San Pedro activists to fight Propositions S & 93, including ironically the local Democratic club. Most of their members also see the problems with these measures and worked with my local neighborhood council to hold a local information forum on Proposition S, the communications tax "preservation" measure. The forum was great for our side, and we recruited about 40 volunteers who walked their neighborhhods this past weekend to encourage voters to vote "NO". San Pedro is a great town, and has a lot of conservative Democrats that know "when to say when" to higher taxes.

We are currently engaged in the Long Beach Unified School District elections by encouraging Republicans to get involved in the campaigns for both incumbents Jon Meyer & Felton Williams. We'll continue to do so through their April re-election. We also support the recall effort of LBUSD Board member and TALB loyalist Michael Ellis, and will continue gathering signatures.

For the remainder of this year, once the Long Beach local elections are completed, our primary focus will be on winning the Assembly seat currently held by termed-out Assemblywoman Betty Karnette. We need to ensure our strongest candidate emerges to take on the strong Democratic candidate, likely LB City Councilwoman Bonnie Lowenthal. Bonnie is going to have a "machine" similar in structure to the Clinton one, and our nominee will need to be ready to spend and do what it takes to win. Bonnie will be a full-time candidate, so our nominee must be as well. This is primarily why I am asking ALL Republicans to get behind two-term PVPUSD Board Member Gabriella Holt, who has dedicated herself full-time to building the strongest campaign now to take on the Democrat nominee.

I'll go into a more detailed analysis of Gabriella Holt in a future posting.

For now, I encourage everyone to learn more about this committee and how to get involved in local elections, including Gabriella Holt's. 2008 offers numeroud opportunities for Republicans to make a difference; I hope we all find at least one and get involved.