[Davis Democrats] December 6th Minutes

[G Richard Yamagata PhD]

Greetings Davis Democrat Club Boardmembers,

These are the minutes that are respectfully submitted to the board:

Davis Democrat Club Meeting
December 6, 2004

This meeting was held at the Blanchard Room in the Yolo County Library. 
Present (17 members total) were:
President: Tony Gruska,
Vice President: Absent
Treasurer: Betty Weir	
Recording Secretary: G Richard Yamagata
Acting Past President: Absent
Newsletter Editor: Dan Kehew 
Publicity: Barbara Slemmons
Special Adjunct Membership Chair: Rita Martin
Parlimentarian: Arun Sen
Board members:  Rhonda Gruska, Mary Lou Hernandez,  John Chendo, Lyle Smith,
Mike Syvanen, Pam Neiberg, Scott Lay, Jim Pollack, Jerry Lester, Julia Sanchez.

Absent from Meeting:   Vice President, Kingsley Melton; Acting Past
President and Newsletter Advertising, Bob Bockwinkel;  Immediate Past
President, Stephen Souza; Past Newsletter support personnel, Adrienne
Kandell; Past Newsletter Editor, Anaïs Vayssières; Special Liaison, Susan
Peter-Thompson; Board Member Max Rothe; Immediate Past Vice President, Joyce
Wilson; Board Member, Rick Vulliet; Board Member Chris Blanchard; Board
Member Vonnie Crutchfield.

Guests:  The representative from the UCD college Democrats, Avi Singh, was
present.  There were five named guests at this meeting with three other
including three children .  The named visitors were:  Kandice Richardson,
Rich Peterson, Jeff Steele, Sarah Taylor, and Burt Bach. Total number of
people at this meeting was 27.

Tony Gruska called the meeting to order at 7:00 PM. 

AGENDA:  The agenda was moved for approval by Tony Gruska.  It was seconded
by Arun Sen.  The agenda passed with no objections.

MINUTES OF PAST MEETINGS: 
The minutes from the August 2nd and the September 6th meetings were moved
for approval by Arun Sen and seconded by Julia Sanchez.  The minutes passed
with objections.

OTHER MINUTES
The Woodland Democrats were not at this meeting, even though a
representative from the group is on the e-mail list.   The UCD Campus
Democrats made a report of their activities.  No Action was required nor
taken on either subject.  

TREASUERER'S REPORT
It was announced that $8,018.50 was in the club's treasury.  All bills have
been paid.  There was a $608 check from SBC, the phone company.  Betty,
having been ill the month of October, is missing the checkbook registry.
Julia stated that it was in the desk that went into storage and that Robin
or Stephen Souza should be contacted.  If this registry cannot be found, it
was stated that the club can ask the bank for copies of the scanned images
of the cancelled checks to reconstruct the missing check registry.

GENERAL MEETING
It was stated that the club needs to have a fundraiser to replenish our
treasury.   It was stated that we should have a February General Meeting and
invite the local electeds.  It was discussed that all of the Davis City
Council would be asked to attend, along with Mike Machado.  It was stated
that on January 10th, the 8th Assembly Democrats are re-organizing with a
caucus to be held at the Blanchard Room.  Jeffrey Steele was asked to save
his comments towards the end of the meeting.  The theme of the February
General Meeting was suggested to be "Thank you, we love our constituents" or
"I love to be a Democrat."  Rhonda Gruska volunteered to put the event
together.  It was tentatively planned for Tuesday the 8th of  February.
Rita Martin also volunteered with finding out if her residential complex
community room would be available.  Mary Lou also volunteered to help with
the planning as to the format of the event, the food and the date.  The date
, Tuesday before Valentine's Day was continued to be discussed with a
program of speeches.

HOLIDAY PARTY
Mike Syvanen passed around a list for sign-up of what food people will bring
to the Holiday Party.  He stated that he would adjust the list if there were
too many of one item that was selected to be brought at the end of the
meeting.  Mary Lou Hernandez is in charge of the raffle and she has lined up
items from DeLuna's, Aggie Fan Club, Strelitzia's, a restaurant, a donation
of two  stuffed donkey dolls by Betty Weir, boxes of See's Candy from VME,
Inc., and gift baskets constructed by Mary Lou.  Tony mentioned that napkins
and paper plates would be needed.  Betty stated that she will get the
napkins and paper plates, along with plastic forks.  Mike Syvanen would
handle picking up the wine, which will all be white wine so as not to stain
the rug if spilled.  Betty will man the front table and take the money.
Mike Syvanen will take care of assigning someone to introduce speakers and
act as master of ceremonies.  The pricing will be $5 for students, $15 for
all others and $30 for couples.  The pricing in the ads that have so far
gone out will stand.

NEWSLETTER
Dan Kehew, the newsletter editor, gave his report.  There will not be a
newsletter announcing the party.  Dan asked for items to be e-mailed to him
and explained that because of the lack of news, he was unable to put
anything together.  He gave his e-mail address and asked for submissions for
articles.  

Mike Syvanen commented that he had coordinated an article from the Machado
campaign that did not appear, because there was no October newsletter.  He
further stated that people with the Machado campaign were upset that this
piece was not printed before the election and with all of this he stated
that providing articles was not high on his list of priorities.  Dan
answered that he had explained why the October newsletter had not come out,
because of lack of other articles to go along with the Machado piece.

John Chendo announced that Tonya Chalupa was interested in providing
interviews with electeds and candidates for comments and news stories for
the newsletter.  John Chendo promised to pass Dan's e-mail address on to
Tonya, so she could contact him.

Dan stated that he was focusing on the candidates with pictures and text.
Now that the elections were over, he was trying to get articles and photos
about office holders.  He plans to use the newsletter as a tool to energize
people with good coverage and fitting pictures

Dan announced that he was job hunting and depending upon the job he gets,
may no longer be able to be editor of a partisan newsletter.  With this
comment, Mary Lou stated that Dan needed to assign or designate a new
newsletter editor in training.  President Tony Gruska stated that we should
have a volunteer step forward and take responsibility of the newsletter in
the event that Dan can no longer produce the newsletter.

BOARD MEMBERSHIP
Jerry Lester said that he will be leaving Davis as a resident and will live
in North Notomas.  Rhonda Gruska stated that she telephoned board members as
a volunteer to help reduce the number of board members that are listed and
not coming to meetings.  She stated that Jerry Lester volunteered to step
down from the Davis Democrat Club board.  She stated that Adrienne's
daughter, Anais, the immediate past editor of the newsletter, cannot come to
the meetings and would like to be removed from the board.  (This causes a
problem because the immediate past editor of the newsletter is suppose to
help with the newsletter for one year after leaving the job of editor
according to the by-laws.  This by-law insures continuity.  That Adrienne
was involved in the production of the newsletter and remains on the board is
a mitigating circumstance.).  Stephen Souza and Scott Lay stated their
objections to this pruning of the board list.  Stephen Souza's term is set
by the by-laws for one year after vacating the office of President.  

Scott Lay stated that he was resigning from the board.  The board did not
note or approve the resignations before it and went further to assign work
to Jerry Lester.  He is to contact Board Members that have missed 3 meetings
in a row via a letter.

Scott Lay went on to say that the by-laws need to define definite terms of
office (Term Limits).  Scott made other suggestions.  It was stated that
having the Chair of the Yolo County Central Committee or a specific
representative on the board of the Davis Democrat Club was important and
should be in the by-laws.  

Betty stated that everyone should have a copy of the by-laws.  They were
passed out in 2003 when Stephen Souza was president.  It was stated that we
need a constitutional committee to tighten the by-laws.  Once the by-laws
are changed, we can have a general meeting to vote on their passage.  The
committee of volunteers and appointees on this by-law committee were:  Tony
Gruska, Arun Sen, Rich Peterson, John Chendo and Mike Syvanen.  Betty Weir
stated that she would like to be on the committee and there were no
objections.  Richard Yamagata was stated to be on the committee as recording
secretary to type up the changes in the by-laws.  

It was stated that the reason so many people feel the need to come to the
board meetings is that there are no general, open meetings.  The club needs
to reach out to the public as a grass roots organization.  We need more open
meetings to bring the public into the club and its sub-committees.  It was
moved by Barbara Slemmons and seconded by Mary Lou Hernandez that we have a
general meeting 6 times a year.  It was stated that officers of the club did
not have the time to spearhead the implementation of all of these meetings.
Richard Yamagata stated that we already have about that many events on the
calendar, which is at the web site as a general outline of events for the
club.  The two events sponsored by the Davis Democrat Club Board are:  The
Champagne Brunch and The Holiday Party.  We already have the annual meeting
in February, sponsor the community booth activity for 4th of July, the Ice
Cream Social in August, and the Fall Barbeque Event.  This totals 6 events
per year.  Barbara withdrew her motion.

It was formally asked that Jerry Lester write to the board members that have
missed  3 or more consecutive meetings to inform them that they would be
removed from the board without a valid excuse for missing the meetings.

There was more discussion of general meetings with Rhonda Gruska stating the
need for more general meetings of the club membership.  It was stated that
the club should have at least one general meeting per quarter that is a
potluck event in addition to the two party events hosted by the Davis
Democrat Club board.    John Chendo made the suggestion that by-law
committee create language defining the number of general meetings and
present it at the next general meeting on its agenda.

YOLO COUNTY YOUNG DEMOCRATS
Rich Peterson and Kandice Richardson spoke about the Yolo County Yound
Democrats.  They will be made up of  the age group, 18 through 35, and will
primarily be people that are not presently in college.  They will be
chartered through the California Young Democrats.   They spoke about the
need for such a group for this age group independent of the older Democrats
and the college Democrats.  Mike Syvanen moved that we support this group.  

It was asked why do be need this group?  It was stated that College Dems
would have a place to go once they have graduated.  Traditionally, the
college students do not join the Davis Democrat Club.  This would provide
somewhere for these people to channel their energy.  It would also provide a
place for high school graduates that do not go on to college and were active
in the high school Democrat clubs.  Dan Kehew seconded the motion and it
passed without dissent.


NEXT CLUB MEETING
The following dates were discussed for the January meeting:  9th, 10th, 11th
and the 18th.  It was stated that Tuesday, January 11th was a good day, as
was January 12th (Wednesday) and the third Monday, January 18th.  Tony would
check on the availability of the Blanchard Room on these dates and will
inform Richard Yamagata and Betty of the date the room is available and
hence the date of the next meeting.

ANNOUNCEMENTS
Jeffrey Steele addressed the board and stated that there is a need to find a
way to reach the people of the state senate district with a message that
speaks to those that should be members of the Democratic Party.  He stated,
Mike Machado's district should not have been a contested district and yet it
was.  The district is a microcosm that reflects what is happening throughout
the state and the nation, that the Democratic Party is not being supported
by those that the party supports.  The demographics in terms of per capita
income show that those in the lower socio-economic bracket are voting
Republican.  If  we can figure out why people are voting Republican and
turning away from the Democratic party, we may be able to turn this trend
around.  We need to turn the people around that the party helps with its
socio-economic platform and need to get the party turned around.

Rita Martin stated that on the Channel 15 calendar that the Democrat Club is
not listed.  She said that she will contact Derek and see what can be done
to add the Davis Democrat Club activities and meetings part of the calendar
listing.

ADJOURNMENT
Richard Yamagata moved for adjournment of the meeting.  Arun Sen seconded
and the motion passed without dissent.  The meeting ended at 8:01PM.

Take care,

Richard