Yesterday, I attended the Sunday morning session of the Illinois Green Party meetings at Eastland Suites. I was last involved with the Greens in 2002 and quit because the party was less well-organized than the People’s Front of Judea. I felt like I was throwing my time, energy and money away.
I’ve grown up a lot in the past seven years and, based on what I saw this morning, the Greens have, too. Rich Whitney ran a good campaign for Governor in 2006 that unlocked the door to ballot access. He is, to my eyes at least, clearly a serious candidate for the 2010 gubernatorial race. His small staff, who he introduced this morning, all have experience working on Green races in Illinois and made an excellent first impression.
There’s something happening here, and certainly there’s no lack of work to be done and opportunity to build something good. I want to be part of it and hope some of Smile Politely’s readership will consider it as well. The local chapter, the Prairie Greens, will be holding a new member orientation in the auditorium of the Urbana Free Library tomorrow, Monday, 20 July, at 7:30 p.m. If you’re interested, the worst that could happen is that you spend an hour meeting some good, hardworking folks who take an interest in making C-U and Illinois better places to live. I hope to see many Smile Politely readers there.
http://ilgp.org/
http://www.whitneyforgov.org/