Newsletter September 2022 | Torrey Pines Democratic Club

Dear Club Members and Friends,

As announced in our e-Newsletter dated September 8th, please join us for our September meeting. Once again the focus is on endorsements and the candidates for consideration are listed below. We need a quorum (at least 20% of our regular members whose dues are currently paid) in order to vote for endorsements, so we request that current members please attend. The balloting for endorsements will be initiated after the meeting by an email sent to each voting member of the Club, using the OpaVote program previously used by the Club.
September 22nd, 2022, Club Endorsement Meeting Agenda

Please Join Us Thursday, September 22nd at 6:00pm (via Zoom)

Link to Join Zoom Meeting:

Topic: TPDC Special Endorsement Meeting
Time: Sep. 22nd, 2022, 06:00 PM Pacific Time (US and Canada)

Link to join Zoom Meeting:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87106677935?pwd=Qlo1MkVaaysvVTJrR3YrdjBPZzdYdz09
Meeting ID: 871 0667 7935
Passcode: 190259

AGENDA
Club endorsements are a great benefit to Democratic candidates. Endorsements help candidates raise campaign money and help voters decide which candidates to support. The Democratic candidates are facing new challenges and opportunities in this election. We can help our candidates win their races by joining with other Clubs, and the San Diego County Democratic Party, with endorsements in the upcoming Election.

Under our bylaws, a quorum of regular voting members is required for considering any endorsement and each endorsement requires a 60% supermajority approval by the regular voting members present. I urge every voting member of our Club to make the effort to attend and participate in this important special meeting.

ORDER OF PROCEDURE FOR ENDORSEMENTS AND RATINGS

As the Endorsement meeting is conducted on Zoom, the following rules apply in accordance with Club bylaws and procedures:

1. Verification of Quorum Present for the Meeting.
A quorum of at least 20% of the regular (voting) members must be present to conduct endorsement proceedings.

2. Presentation of the Candidate’s Statement.
Each candidate, or the candidate’s representative, will be offered the opportunity to present their remarks to the members, subject to a 3-minute time limit. When there are multiple candidates for a given race, the order in which they present their remarks will be determined by coin toss.

3. Question and Answer Period.
Following the presentations of the candidates for each race, there will be an opportunity for voting members to ask questions. When there are multiple candidates for a given race, no questions shall be aimed at one particular candidate; each candidate shall be given one minute to answer each question. Questions must be limited to those that are pertinent to the office the candidate is seeking. Each question should be stated in 30 seconds or less; must be made in the form of a question; and no statements will be permitted. The question-and-answer period is not an opportunity for debate or argument.

The candidate will be allowed up to one minute for response to each question. Candidates are expected to respond in a direct manner, and not use the question time for raising additional issues not mentioned by the other candidate or the questioner.

A total time of 10 minutes for question-and-answer will be allowed for each race.

4. Candidate’s Closing Statement.
At the conclusion of the question-and-answer period, the candidate will have up to 2 minutes for a closing statement.

5. Discussions By Voting Members,
Following the closing statements for all candidates, the non-voting members, guests, candidates and their representatives, will be assigned to a separate breakout room or may leave the meeting. There will be no follow-up discussions between candidates and voting members after this point in the meeting, and all balloting will be by email as described below. The breakout room will not have video or audio access to the deliberations.

During the Discussion Period of voting members, members may address questions, comments, or make statements to the assembled voting members. This portion of the meeting will not be recorded. The Club Secretary will not record the discussions during this period in the official minutes. Voting members may request to be recognized by use of the “Raise Hand” feature on Zoom.

Members will be recognized in the order in which their “raise hand” button is actuated. When recognized, the member may address one or more issues or candidates and will be allowed 30 seconds in which to do so. Other voting members are not permitted to respond to a member’s comments, except as part of their own comments when recognized by the Chair. The Discussion period will continue until every member present has had at least one opportunity to speak and, at the discretion of Chair, no more than fifteen minutes additional time may be allowed.

6. Voting Procedures for Members.
The balloting will be initiated by an email sent to each voting member of the Club, using the OpaVote program previously used by the Club.
The email will include an online link to the ballot. Each member who accesses the link provided in the email will be considered as being “present” for the vote. Each voting member will be able to cast only one ballot. The votes will be anonymous.

To be approved for endorsement, the candidate must receive at least 60% affirmative votes of the total members “present and voting” at a meeting at which a quorum of eligible members is present. Under this election process, a quorum is achieved if 20% or more of the eligible members access the online link. A supermajority vote is achieved if at least 60% of the completed ballots returned are cast for one of the options on the ballot. For the ballot to be completed, the voting member must “send” or return a filled-in ballot to the online service that tallies the votes. Ballots returned that are not filled in will be considered not complete and will not be counted as voting.

Voting members will have a fixed period (about three days) in which to open and review the email and return the completed ballot by clicking on the “send” button. Results of the email polling on these endorsements will be announced as soon as the results are verified.

We have three races to consider. They are:

Solana Beach School Board: Areas 1, 3, and 4 are up for election. Vicki King is the incumbent in Area 3. She has no opponent so will be reelected without her name being on the ballot. Here’s the school district map.

Democratic candidate for Area 1
- Debra Schade (incumbent) www.schade4kids.com
Democratic candidates for Area 4:
- Gaylin Allbaugh (incumbent)
- Charles Ringer

Del Mar City Council: At last month’s special endorsement meeting, Dwight Worden was the only Democrat in the race. He spoke and the club endorsed him. Since then two more Democrats have entered the race. We have the opportunity to endorse one additional candidate, since we can only endorse one candidate per seat and there will be two open seats on the November ballot.

Terry Gaasterland, tgfordelmar.com
Steve Quirk

Del Mar Union School District Board of Trustees:

Kathleen Fitzpatrick (incumbent)
Doug Rafner (incumbent)

Ballot propositions:

All seven of the ballot propositions will appear on our OpaVote ballot. Only Proposition 1, the Right to Reproductive Freedom Amendment, is planned to have a discussion at our meeting, but you can learn more about the propositions here: https://ballotpedia.org/California_2022_ballot_propositions and here: https://calmatters.org/explainers/california-ballot-measures-2022/ .

All eligible candidates have been invited to appear, or send a representative, for our meeting and to address their interests and qualifications for your endorsement.

In Solidarity,

Ken Burtt

Dear Club Members and Friends,

Please join us for our September meeting. Once again the focus is on endorsements. We need a quorum (at least 20% of our regular members whose dues are currently paid) in order to vote for endorsements, so we request that current members please attend. The balloting for endorsements will be initiated after the meeting by an email sent to each voting member of the Club, using the OpaVote program previously used by the Club.

Torrey Pines Democratic Club September Meeting