We had a very good DA Meeting this past saturday. The meeting was informational, well attended and by our standards very long. One breath of fresh air for this meeting was the number of new members attending. It appears we may be about to get a new chapter starting up in San Antonio. Mr. Stateson and his two sons were present to discuss the possibility.
Another highlight of the meeting was when Mando, our dist 29 Advisor, showed up he was being chauffered by none other than Da'Lady(Rep. Chavez). The El Paso chapter had done a fund raiser and turned in $931 to the state office. They had designed a nice T-shirt for the event and we will see about getting some made as a state product.
The upcoming campaigns and elections were the primary topic of conversation Actually you might say the lack of campaigns was the most striking news to those present. Our main concentration is of course on the state legislature. We have 15 Senate seats up for re-election this year. Of those 15 only 4 districts ( 10, 26, 30 and 31 ) are contested.. That means that nearly 75% of the seats are walkins. It was agreed that of those four, district 10 should be a priority. We supported Senator Brimer last time based on his record as a State Rep. His ascenion to Senator was followed by arrogance and a downright go to hell attitude. We feel he should be met with the same go to hell attitude during this campaign. A win for his opponent is the way to do this.
The House races offer no better story than the Senate. Of 150 House seats up forelection, 92 are walkins. This leads us to determine that we have been teaching the first part of "Five Steps" long enough. It is now time to concentrate on Step Five. We shall put together another booklet and call it "Take The High Ground" or some such and will deal with becoming a legislator. Uncontested seats can no longer be acceptable.
Four of our Warriors are in contested races this year. Of course we all agreed that we stand by our own. We can't afford to lose either of these seats. If you live in Cherokee, Houston, Panola or Rusk county you are in House Dist. 11. Warrior Chuck Hopson needs your support. Contact his campaign at 903-586-2208 in Jacksonville and offer your help.
If you live in Liberty, Polk or the Eastern part of Montgomery county you are in House Dist. 18. Warrior Dan Ellis needs your support. Dan was very instrumental in saving our Rider Training Fund from being ttaken away last session. Contact his campaign at 936-327-4084 in Livingston and join his campaign effort.
Warrior Patrick Rose, 512-353-0664 needs support from those riders in South Traviscounty and Warrior John Mabry 254-753-6437 needs your help in the Waco area Don't wait to get involved and don't spare any effort to win these four seats. IF we are to convince our members to run for office in 2006 we must prove that we can put them in office.
If you have been active at all in the past then you know who in your district has supported our issues and who has been adversarial. Act accordingly. This election is too important to sit on the sidelines. Don't forget our nonmember friends like Reps. Hupp, Pitts and Hunter. If you have any questions on the contest in your district give us a call at 512-971-6777 and we will try to help by sharing what we know based on their record or stated goals.
Your chairman has been put in Congressional district 22 and will be busting butt to get Richard Morrison elected to Tom DeLay's seat. Any of you who live in Galveston, Brazoria or south Harris county please contact me and let's give this one all we have to give. It is winnable and we finally have the chance to show our true mettle
In other business we agreed that an 800 number should be forwarded to the office cellphone as I am the one to answer questions. It may mean increasing to an unlimited account on the cell but we shall see.
And finally we decided to set up the CALLING POST, currently in use by some chapters, to get out important messages during the session. It will cost $0.075 per call to notify members when an issue has hit crunch time and it is time to generate calls to our legislators. Remember the calls against the Pay-at-The-Pump insurance that paid off so well? When you get a call from this POST please make use of the information immediately. Only then will the cost be worthwhile.
Have I done that which I can do to the best of my ability?
HELL NO !! - but I'm trying.
Sputnik
