George:

Some decisions were made [at the December 16th Charlottesville Democratic Committee meeting]:

1. February 21 will be the nominating convention -- starting at 1:00 PM, with notice to all that it will not be a quickie unless something unexpected happens. Folks should expect speeches and preliminaries to take us to at least 2:00 PM before the first ballot is cast. And depending on how many candidates we have and how competitive they are, it could take one ballot or four. If I were betting, I'd say we'll be there until 4:00 PM. We will give each candidate 8 minutes to do whatever they want -- speeches, nominating speeches, seconding speeches, audio-visual presentations, singing and dancing, you name it. The preference was for the Lane Auditorium at the County Office Building; I'll check on its availability and price.

2. The actual rules of the meeting will be very close to the rules we used last time, with only such tweaks as are necessary to reflect that we now have 3 offices to fill, and to correct any problems that we encountered before.

3. We will set a pre-filing deadline around February 13 (we didn't decide exactly, but there was consensus that there should be one with enough lead time to allow us to get organized, but not so far out as to deter late-comers to the ball). Each "pre-filing" shall be signed by the candidate and by the person nominating and the person seconding the nomination. (That way, we can just announce who the nominator and seconder are, and we don't necessarily have to have a speech from each.)

4. We will try to put together a flyer for distribution on February 10 at the polls, based on anyone who has pre-filed by about February 1. The flyer will have information on the convention, and will have information on known candidates.

5. We will try to figure out ways to hold down the costs of campaigning for the nomination. We will send out one mailing from the Party to everyone on our mailing list, with a piece of paper provided by the candidate(s). If we have six candidates, we can send out one six-page mailing cheaper than six one-page mailings. We can also look at putting information up on the Party's website about each of the candidates.

6. We will try to have at least two fora.

7. I would like to know as soon as possible about any possible candidates. This is on a "not for publication" basis -- if there are folks who should be recruited, or who are thinking actively but want some feedback on it all, I'd like to talk to prospective candidates right away.

8. Our February 28 fundraiser will be the best ever -- everyone should mark their calendars for that as well.

9. We are looking for volunteers to help with the following:

a. Anyone want to work on arrangements for the February 21 meeting? Some folks want to offer child care; that needs to be arranged. Shirley Cauley will need help with Credentials logistics that day -- checking people in, etc.

b. I have asked David RePass to again chair the Temporary Rules Committee. If you want to be a part of that effort, call him or me.

c. We need folks who want to help organize public fora for the candidates.

d. I'd love to have someone take charge of the flyer that we will have available to primary voters about the Council nominating convention and candidates.

e. I'd love to have the help of web-savvy folks who might help candidates, and Jackson Landers (our custodian of the website), put information about themselves on the web.

f. We need help putting on the fundraiser. Nancy O'Brien and others are hard at work on the auction; we need the following tasks performed as well:

1. Printing, distributing, selling tickets.
2. Publicity -- mailings, flyers, e-mails, etc.
3. Decorating the hall and setting it up on February 28.
4. Cleaning up.
5. Recruiting chefs.
6. Recruiting sponsors and other major donors.
7. Door prizes. Other fun stuff.
8. You tell me -- what would make this fun, and the best Pasta Dinner ever?

10. Finally, George, I am pleased to report that we started on time, we ended on time, and we had a quorum.

Lloyd Snook (electronic mail, December 18, 2003)