I have given a great deal of
thought to the upcoming chair’s election. I am waiting until January 8th
to make a public endorsement. I’ve had extensive conversations with both
candidates about my choice to be the next FDP
chair. I encourage you to reach out to both Alan Clendenin and Allison Tant
Richard as you make your own decisions.
I chair a DEC and I also work
with progressive groups; albeit unpaid, and the divide between paid operatives
and activists is a sore subject among many Democrats in Florida. I DO get paid for
my policy work, my writing, and sometimes my public speaking, but I generally donate
my time to politics. I get a little annoyed about some of the activists who
don't work with the DEC structure and go off and do their own things and then
throw rocks back at those of us who hold Democratic Party positions. Then, I
also get upset with the paid operatives who hold up their noses and do things
like refer to DEC people and activists as "wack-tivists" and make
other disparaging remarks.
Some of you know I am an academic
but many of you probably don't know my primary discipline is Sociology. As a
sociologist, I've been trained to analyze organizational culture and I can't
help but view all of this through a particular theoretical and obviously,
wonky, lens. I would love for this election to allow us the opportunity to
engage in critical discourse about the culture of FDP
and all of the related organizations that make up the larger culture of
Democratic politics in Florida. People often over use the word vision but it might be
appropriate to consider what our vision of a functional, successful party would
be.
I’ve heard much said since discussions about a successor to
Rod Smith began about different issues we need to resolve within the party. First,
let me say that putting the onus for change solely on the shoulders of the
party chair is unrealistic. Yes, there are things the chair can do. But there
are also limits to what the chair can do.
I have been reading the recent discourse on the Facebook
threads – all rife with complaints and conjecture.
One set of remarks focused on how DECs and Clubs don’t have
action plans and don’t discuss electoral goals or strategy. Seriously, where does that fault reside? You are telling me you blame the party for
what you don’t do in your home county? Come on, folks, you ARE
the party where you live. You are the insiders in your community. What are you doing to be the change you want
to see?
Now, don’t get me wrong. I have my beefs with the
powers-that-be. It killed me to see RPOF pump $10k into my county early in the
electoral cycle. It was used to work against my county commission candidates.
And there I was with my DEC slaving to hit the goal for the small county grant
while also opening a headquarters to support the presidential campaign. Both my
Democratic county commission candidates lost. It hurts. I COULD blame the party
and the lack of support from Tallahassee.
But I have to be honest and say that we could be building a better
infrastructure here in Wakulla. We have work to do. We all do.
I was really mad when I read the recent post on The
Political Hurricane blog that discounted small counties in general and North
Florida in particular.
There have been two blogs that have really made this
election be uglier and more divisive than it needs to be. Progressive Caucus Chair Susan Smith got it
right when she said we need to remember that we all need to be able to come
together after January 26th to elect Democrats in 2014. How effective can we be moving forward if we
burn the house down now? Some of you might like to think that the Democratic
Party could be like the phoenix rising from the ashes of an ugly chair’s race
but I have to think that the wounds inflicted now might be hard to heal in the
relatively short time we have remaining to win back the governor’s mansion.
Only a few small counties have let our coalition chair Dave
Dew know where they stand on the chair’s race.
Our strength as a coalition rests in our capacity to unite and vote as a
block.
If we don’t stand together in the weighted vote for the
chair’s race, then we at least need to be considering the impact we can have as
a voting block for the rest of the leadership seats when the process becomes
one person, one vote. That said, having
a discussion within our caucus about where we stand is still a good idea. Dave
Dew has circulated the answers to the questionnaires we asked the candidates to
answer. I’m looking forward to Dave Dew scheduling a date for a Small County
Coalition conference call to give us an opportunity to discuss the
questionnaires.
What am I hoping for in new leadership for the FDP?
I would like to see us be able to cover all the bases – from fundraising to
messaging, from infrastructure development for DECs to candidate recruitment up
and down the ballot across the state.
Above all, I am looking forward to having a united party
that is ready to win back the governor’s mansion in 2014.
Rachel Sutz Pienta, PhD
Chair and State Committeewoman, Wakulla DEC
Board of Directors and Founding Member, Democratic
Progressive Caucus of Florida
Communications Chair, Democratic Women’s Club of Florida,
Inc.
850-321-3582
@wakullawriter
