WASHINGTON
- July 7 - Four D.C. Statehood Green Party
candidates for public office delivered completed
ballot petitions to the Board of Elections and Ethics
on Wednesday, July 5, the due date for placing names
on the ballot in the District of Columbia. Statehood
Greens have major party status in the District, and
candidates will participate in the September primary
and November general elections.
Housing, health care, and human rights activist Arturo
Griffiths will compete for the At-Large seat on D.C.
City Council. The last elected party (D.C. Statehood
Party, before the merger in 1999 with the D.C. Green
Party) member to sit on Council was Hilda Mason, who
also occupied an At-Large seat.
D.C. public high school teacher Tom Briggs is running
for the Ward 2 Council seat. Labor lawyer and the
D.C. Human Rights Commissioner Renée Bowser is the
Ward 4 candidate. Martin Thomas is running for D.C.
"Shadow" Representative. (Tracey Joyner, candidate
for Ward 8, has dropped out of the race for personal
reasons.)
Ralph Nader and running mate Winona LaDuke will be
listed on the D.C. ballot as Statehood Green Party
candidates for President and Vice President of the
United States. Four D.C. Statehood Green delegates,
including At-Large Board of Education member Gail
Dixon, attended the National Nominating Convention of
the Green Party in Denver, Colorado on June 24 and 25.
Statehood Green activist, D.C. public school parent,
and track coach Thomas Smith will run for the At-Large
seat on the D.C. Board of Education in November, for
which ballot petitions are due later this summer.
The Statehood Green Party campaigned intensely against
passage of the charter amendment referendum to convert
the Board of Education to a partially appointed body,
for which D.C. voters cast ballots on June 27 and
results (too close to call last week) will be
announced on Friday, July 7.
Statehood Greens called the amendment an assault on
the democratic voting rights of parents and other D.C.
voters, and also cited the failure of D.C.'s last
educational bureaucracy, the Board of Trustees
appointed by the Financial Control Board, which closed
16 schools and allowed millions of unaccounted-for
dollars to disappear.
Statehood Green candidates and supporters consider
Democratic elected officials who supported the
referendum especially vulnerable in the 2000 election.
The "Vote Yes" effort was bankrolled by
representatives of America On-Line, Marriott Hotels,
and other out-of-town businesses -- after a court
order stopped Mayor Anthony Williams from using
taxpayer money and payed public employees to campaign
for the referendum.
The D.C. Statehood Green Party, which accepts no
corporate contributions, has criticized the extent to
which public policy decisions from both District
officials and Congress, which oversees D.C.
legislation, serve wealthy and powerful business
interests, resulting in exploitative development,
neglect of low-income neighborhoods, displacement of
residents, environmental decay, and weakening of the
democratic rights of the people of the District.
A few examples of these are construction of a
convention center in the Shaw neighborhood, eviction
of tenants in Columbia Heights, the placement of trash
transfer stations, the disappearance from Ward 8 of a
major grocery store (the Statehood Green Party helped
set up a Saturday farmers' market in Anacostia last
year), the overruling of Initiative 59 ("medical
marijuana"), and plans for a ballpark on Massachusetts
Avenue.
Contact information for the D.C. Statehood Green Party
and its candidates:
ARTURO GRIFFITHS for At-Large Member of DC City
Council. Committee to Elect Arturo Griffiths, Lisa
Ranghelli, Treasurer. Contact (202) 265-2659.
RENÉE BOWSER for Ward 4 Member of Council. Committee
to Elect Renée Bowser, Mike Livingston, Treasurer.
Contact (202) 291-3636.
TOM BRIGGS for Ward 2 Member of Council. Contact
(202) 265-9176. Other information to be announced.
MARTIN THOMAS for DC "Shadow" Representative. Thomas
for Shadow Rep, Philip Barlow, Treasurer. Contact
(202) 332-1709.
THOMAS E. SMITH for At-Large Member of the DC Board of
Education. Contact (202) 737-8088.
RALPH NADER for President, WINONA LADUKE for Vice
President. Nader 2000 Primary Committee, Inc., PO Box
18002, Washington, DC 20036, 202-265-4000 x15.
Information: , (202)
265-4000, . National
headquarters: 1225 15th Street NW.
DC Statehood Green Party
Association of State Green Parties (which organized
the Denver Green Party Convention)
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