The next meeting of the county Democrats will be Saturday, Feb. 8, at 10:00 AM on Zoom. Here is the Zoom information: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85408413717?pwd=g1w3UO4AOoXo0dobjPtNK43idn1Qko.1 Meeting ID: 854 0841 3717 Passcode: f9P875
Our special guest will be Shasti Conrad, chair of the state Democratic Party. She will hopefully spend about an hour with us right at the beginning of our meeting and will field questions from those in attendance. Hope to see you there.
The January meeting of the county Democrats will be Saturday, January 11, at 10:00 on Zoom. Here is the Zoom information:
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84698867190?pwd=xjQWWzaOMJXkNdPcHWUsX3b25ywDaO.1
Meeting ID: 846 9886 7190
Passcode: 7YR28k
The next meeting of the San Juan County Democrats will be on Saturday, Dec. 14, at 10:00 AM on Zoom.
From Pam Hoke, our Friday Harbor activist working to elect Harris/Walz in Michigan:
FYI, the Michigan One Team here is truly a top notch operation! Below is a link to share with SJC Dems who would like to roll their sleeves up to help us win Michigan, which has been determined to ultimately secure Kamala and Tim’s victory.
Virtual Phone Banks, postcards, and options for those who wish to come here towards the final stretch: Mobilize Michigan:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfxK-E-U7TanqZaTzcVf9LuVoafNZ9tWhFXAN5gEVVpCvzhbA/viewform
At our meeting, we voted to endorse the following:
Cantwell for Senator Larsen for House of Representatives
Heck for Lieutenant Governor Hobbs for Secretary of State
McCarthy for Auditor Yes on Land Bank Renewal
On the matter of candidates for County Council from Orcas/Waldron #2, we made no recommendation. It will be up to each voter to do the research and make a decision. You can find our previous endorsements on our website at https://sjdemocrats.org/2024-endorsements/,
and you will receive our endorsement postcard just before the election starts next month. Be sure to hang onto the postcard to help you with your voting.
We heard from new member Pam Hoke from Friday Harbor, who is driving to Grand Rapids, Michigan, to head up a field office for the Harris/Walz ticket. She pulled off the road in South Dakota with a view of Mt. Rushmore in the background to have a conversation with us about what she is doing. We support Pam in her efforts and look forward to hearing more about her experiences. Eventually she will have it set up so that you can go to her website at pamelahoke.com to get to the blog she will be posting about her experiences.
We had a report from Diane Martindale about our very successful booth at the county fair. Many thanks to Diane, David Dehlendorf, and all of those who helped set up the booth, staff it, and prepare the materials that were available. It was a great way for more people to get to know about us, and we even had some fairgoers attend our meeting today.
I will put in one more plug for donating to the county Democrats. It is only through contributions that we are able to fund things like the postcard and our booth at the fair. Thanks to all who give monthly or who have contributed otherwise this year. If you would like to send a monthly contribution (with no amount too small) or a single donation, go to secure.actblue.com/donate/sjcountydems. Or a check can be mailed to San Juan County Democrats at PO Box 1007, Friday Harbor, WA 98250
Next meeting will be Oct. 12 at 10:00 AM on Zoom.
Here is the information for our August 10 meeting at 10:00 AM:
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89906199553?pwd=wcSSsgAR51M7iuCzjGnzi5H1ne2qMk.1
Meeting ID: 899 0619 9553
Passcode: YeTqm9
We will have two guest speakers. Justin Paulsen, candidate for county council from Orcas and Waldron, will join us. At this point, he has not expressed interest in being endorsed by a political party, but he wants to present to us in order to get to know him. And very importantly, we will hear from a representative of Defend Washington, which is leading the fight against some devastating initiatives that will appear on the November ballot and which we absolutely must defeat. They are 2117 to repeal the Climate Commitment Act, 2109 to repeal the capital gains excise tax, and 2124 to dismantle WA Cares.
July 4 parade in Friday Harbor. Contact David Dehlendorf at dauffa@gmail.com or Susan Grout at grout@rockisland.com
July 13 meeting at 10:00 AM most likely on Zoom. Contact David Turnoy at davidgeri@rockisland.com
August 15-18 Democrats booth at county fair. Contact Diane Martindale at diane.martindale@rockisland.com to volunteer
Rick Hughes visited our group for the first hour. Rick’s family goes way back in the islands, and he was our county councilor from 2013-2020. He is a big supporter of the Land Bank, but in the past he has mentioned supporting a property tax on its property. When asked about this most recently, Rick said this was actually just an idea he was considering, and in fact, he would not favor a tax on the Land Bank. As to developing Land Bank property, he would only allow agriculture on it.
Rick would not reopen the vacation rental caps except to possibly restrict the percentage of them in certain neighborhoods. He only supports improving the current setup and would not bring up the issue himself.
Rick says we need at least 10% more county employees, including a second code enforcement officer. Should we run into a budget shortfall, he would want to have a conversation with the residents to see what they favor.
Rick has a lot of experience from his years in office. He also made lots of contacts in Olympia and Washington, DC, and he maintains those contacts.
Rick is a big supporter of renewable energy. He has installed 89 KW of solar panels on his commercial and residential buildings. He put as much solar on county buildings as he could while in office.
Rick will work to improve ferry service, especially making sure we never have a shortage of crew, perhaps going so far as to train the galley person as a crew member. He opposes cutting the number of sailings, would support at least partially owning a shipyard for repairs and building new boats, got a new boat while in office, maintained funding.
Rick is very pro-choice, advocates for reproductive freedom and services. As the owner of an independent pharmacy, he tries to get more access to pharmacy and medical services. During Covid, he worked to get vaccines and administered many himself.
Rick pledges that he will listen more, that he is more humble than before, will take a balanced approach to growth and tourism, try for more sustainability. We need to be prepared if we are cut off from the mainland.
Other points: Rick introduced a DEI resolution, wants local food sovereignty, more affordable housing, improve relationship between FH and county, cost of living here needs to be recognized for state funding of education, no interest in enlarging urban growth boundary for development, isn’t pushing for more population, will work with outlying islands and not take away equipment.
Next we spent about 45 minutes discussing the race for Congress. A young woman named Shauna Barrows presented for a group of young SJI progressives arguing for endorsement of Jason Call instead of Rick Larsen. Many of her colleagues and our veterans chimed in with similar sentiments. Ultimately neither Rick Larsen nor Jason Call were endorsed. We were heartened by the participation of these young people, we welcomed them profusely and thanked them for participating, and we hope they will return.
We then spent an hour or a little more on considering candidates and then voting on endorsements. Here are the results:
Public Lands – Dave Upthegrove
Treasurer – Mike Pellicciotti
Insurance – Patty Kuderer
Public Instruction – Chris Reykdal
Appeals Court Judge – Cecily Hazelrigg
County Council District 1 – Kari McVeigh
Attorney General – Manka Dhingra
Supreme Court – Sal Mungia
San Juan Island Library Levy – Yes
Already earlier endorsed:
Governor – Bob Ferguson
State Senator – Liz Lovelett
State Representatives – Debra Lekanoff, Alex Ramel
Congress – No endorsement at this time, as we could not agree on just Larsen or Call or a dual endorsement.
County Council District 2 – No endorsement at this time as we want to hear from the other major candidate, which will happen in August.
As we move into the general election after the primary, there will be further consideration of the two races not yet endorsed for.
Hello San Juan County Democrats,
The county Democrats would like to go all out in this crucial election year to elect Democrats up and down the ballot…our democracy is truly in jeopardy. To help promote Democrats, we want to have an entry in the 4th of July Parade on San Juan Island, we want to have a double fair booth at the county fair in August (15-18), and we have to send out our election postcard with our endorsements in the fall. We have people organizing each of these items, but we need money to make them happen.
If you can, please consider a one-time significant donation. We have recently changed our PDC reporting status to full reporting, which means we can accept donations larger than $500. Please make out a check to the San Juan County Democrats and mail to San Juan County Democrats, PO Box 1007, Friday Harbor, WA 98250. Or, if you can afford a smaller monthly donation, you can do this through ActBlue at secure.actblue.com/donate/sjcountydems. Thanks to those of you who have been helping us.
If you would like to participate in the 4th of July Parade, you can contact Susan Grout at 360-317-4116 or grout@rockisland.com. This is a very fun activity that not only lets our residents know we are a Democratic county, it also shows that to visitors. Lots of people attend the parade, and the Democrats’ entry receives lots of cheers. Please consider participating whether you are on San Juan Island or another island.
The county fair is another very important event to get the word out about the election and the candidates we are supporting. We need at least 25 volunteers to staff the booth, where we will have information to hand out, a comment board, and we also expect to have visits from candidates. The person to contact is David Dehlendorf at 206-669-2478 or dauffa@gmail.com. Anyone working a shift will be provided with a free ticket to get into the fair. This should be another fun experience, and we again are encouraging folks from other islands to come over and work a shift.
Now is the time to step up your involvement in the San Juan County Democrats and be as generous as you can with your donations. We also hope to provide you with information as we get closer to the election on how you can participate in a letter writing campaign to folks in the swing states.
Other odds and ends from today’s meeting: Senator Liz Lovelett presented to us about the recent session and answered wide-ranging questions. If you would like to see a recording of Liz and the rest of the meeting, you can see it at https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/9hrCIyWeQcGWnDkZN16atPDpYr7oCrz15pLfXUkFHbsEqsPT8qbkCiM50gBEET2_.4VZtel5F8XYvQUzX
Passcode: 1Ijx0UP$ Rep. Lekanoff was traveling, so she provided us with a video to watch, which you can also watch at
https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/R2lZeXNckgrvyl2XQSW63SR5JRClfRBvWj87ManxCu8V4skUG45a_AWkfYn47D-T.y0N0kBKgz3HR5NRj
Passcode: 0@@@f0SK Rep. Ramel was also traveling, and he sent a short video expressing regrets at missing our meeting. [It doesn’t have a link for me to provide.]
We had a visit from candidate for Commissioner of Public Lands Dave Upthegrove. Dave has served in the legislature, as a King County Councilor, and is currently chair of that body. He is a committed environmentalist who has made a lot of strides in that area. To learn more about him, go to www.upthegrove.org and you can contact him at dave@upthegrove.org. He will be one of the major candidates for this position.
Finally, we endorsed our state legislators as a slate today. We have been extremely well-served by Liz Lovelett, Debra Lekanoff, and Alex Ramel, and we wish for them to carry on.
Thanks for reading,
David Turnoy
Chair, San Juan County Democrats
360-376-4165
davidgeri@rockisland.com
The next meeting of the county Democrats will be on Saturday, April 13, at 10:00 AM on Zoom. One of our guests will be Senator Rebecca Saldana, candidate for Commissioner of Public Lands. We will also hear from Senator Liz Lovelett and Representative Debra Lekanoff about the recently completed legislative session. Representative Alex Ramel is unable to attend, but he has sent a brief video that I will play at the meeting.
Here is the Zoom information:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82062335964?pwd=K0lldHM3bk9GWWFIa2w0TjIrUktsZz09
Meeting ID: 820 6233 5964
Passcode: Ja7p9q
Our senator and representatives are running as a slate this year. They continue to do an exceptional job representing our interests, and in that spirit, we are proposing to vote on an early endorsement for them at the meeting. If you have attended at least two meetings in the past year, you are eligible to vote on this matter.