Mainly, I just wanted to report on the results of the voting from last weekend's Annual State Meeting of the Green Party of Texas. The biggest news of all for Texas Greens is that the Annual Meeting split into two meetings during odd-numbered years like this one. Expect a second meeting in October or November, at which time there will be opportunities to vote on some bylaw amendments that need to be reworked to the satisfaction of two-thirds of the delegates.
I should also mention one of the oddities of this meeting: the complete lack of delegates from Bexar County. San Antonio Greenies made a might contribution to last April's nominating convention, including their two candidates for seats in the State Legislature. Bexar County's chapter is still active (although not listed on the txgreens.org site for reasons I cannot guess) and Tweeting regularly.
State Executive Committee
Co-chair Laura Palmer and the Treasurer Travis Christal will continue in office until the 2022 state convention. These members were elected or re-elected Saturday (26 June) by approval voting, with their home counties in parentheses:
- Co-chair: Wesson (Wes) Gaige (Collin)
- Secretary: Matt Bauman (Tarrant)
- At-Large: David Prout (Travis), Alexander (Xander) James (Harris), Tykisha (Kisha) Murphy (Galveston), Hunter Crow (Tarrant), and Alfred Molison (Harris
Xander and Kisha are fairly new arrivals to GPTX. Kisha and some other Galveston County residents will have an opportunity to reanimate the Gavleston County Green Party in the coming year, should they choose to accept the mission.
National Committee Delegates
The following ten folks will represent Texas on the Green Party US's National Committee, having received the ten highest numbers of approvals:
- Alfred Molison (Harris)
- Christa Schelter (Tarrant)
- Hunter Crow (Tarrant)
- kat gruene (Travis)
- Nancy Gaige (Collin)
- Rachel Muldez (Dallas)
- Rachel Schelter (Tarrant)
- Travis Christal (Tarrant)
- Wes Gaige (Collins)
- Xander James (Harris)
Yes, it is not only permitted but fairly common for members to have seats on both the SEC and the NC. There are also two alternates in the event that one of the ten must vacate: Alán Alán Apurim and Bernadine Williams.
Bylaw Amendments
Approved by 2/3 majority:
- Obligation of County affiliates to cooperate with nominating convention process
- Expanding state meetings to two in each year (corrected: originally said "each odd-numbered year." Thanks, Laura P.!
- Modifying rules regarding language of oppression and removal of membership for use thereof, among other misrepresentations of Green policy positions
- Adding options No Candidate (i.e. don't nominate anyone) and None of the Others to internal approval-voting ballots where appropriate
Rejected or Tabled:
These may be brought up for reconsideration in the Fall 2021 GPTX meeting.
- Forbidding individuals to hold county-issued Green Party DBA's
- Simplifying qualifications for presidential candidates to be nominated
- Stipulating a goal of working toward geographic diversity in the State Executive Committee
- Additional language concerning the filling of vacant seats on the SEC
- A rather complicated set of rules regarding transfer of financial documents from outgoing to incoming county treasurers (we might explore this in a later post here)
Platform Amendments and Resolutions
These I will definitely discuss in a later post. The good news is that all the proposed platform amendments were accepted by a majority of the delegates, irrespective of their disagreements on other matters.