Minutes of the Carroll County Democratic Central Committee
April 14, 2016

In attendance:  Don West, Anita Riley, Corynne Courpas,
Mitch Edelman, Frank Rammes, Charles Harrison, Dorothy
Scanlan, Tom Scanlan, Zach Hands

Guest:  Bill Duffield, field organizer for David Trone.  He
is looking for volunteers to help with the last couple of
weeks of the campaign.

The meeting was called to order at 7:00pm by Don West.

Pledge of Allegiance

Chair’s Report

Don attended the wrap-up meeting for the Rural Maryland
Summit.  The summit did well and made some money.  Next
year’s summit will be April 28-19 at Rocky Gap.  Greg
Pecoraro is now chair of the group.

The full state party meeting is on May 21st and most every
committee member will be attending.

Don noted that early voting started today.

Happy hour with the Comptroller was a success.  We should
try to have events like this more often.  Perhaps we could
invite Brian Frosh or Mike Busch.

Secretary’s Report

Both the February and March minutes were approved, initiated
by a motion from Anita.

Treasurer’s Report

There is a balance of $2,470.16 in our checking account. 
Corynne has filed two reports; the next report is due in
August.  In the past, $4,000 was budgeted for a
headquarters.  We need to decide whether that will be
adequate for this election. Treasurer’s report was approved.

Club Reports

CC Dems: The informal forum held for the Board of Education
candidates was very successful.  Everyone who attended
thought it was most worthwhile.  The club will plan to have
another in September.  The club will host Angela Augustus,
head of HSC, for its May meeting.  The annual picnic will
likely be in July.

South Carroll Club:  no report

Committee Reports

Local Politics:  Hearings for the appeals filed in protest
of school closings were held this week.  A decision will be
rendered in early May as to whether the appeal can move
forward.  The Board of Education has been firing back at
Commissioner Rothschild.  Both sides are digging in. 
Commissioner Frazier tried to have the super majority vote
overturned.

Annapolis:  After years of voting against a similar bill,
the delegation is now supporting a bill that would provide
money to counties with declining enrollment.  Otherwise
there was no significant education legislation sponsored by
our delegation.  They did support numerous gun bills which
would have weakened public safety protections.

Communications:  Don requested that we all look at the
website from time to time to make sure it is up to date. 
Mark is very responsive to requests for changes.  Don said
that the public does look at it—he has gotten calls from
people with questions.  We will send out an eblast to
promote early voting and to remind people when primary
election day is.  Next we will send out an eblast promoting
the Democratic Victory dinner.  The CCDCC Facebook page is
doing very well.  There is lots of interest and activity.
Perhaps another Facebook campaign is in order.  A motion was
made to allocate $100 for an ad campaign which would run for
seven days.  Motion passed.

VAN:  Zach has been working on creating clusters for walk
lists.

Events

Democratic Victory dinner:   We still need to find a keynote
speaker.  At this point we will wait until after the
election to contact potential speakers.  We need to recruit
ads and silent auction items.  The deadline for ads is May
10.  Anita has created seven baskets so far.  We could ask
Damian Halstad to donate a will as he has in the past. 
Otherwise, everything is all set to go.

Old Business

Board of Elections:  Frank went to the meeting where they
unveiled the new machines.  He received thanks for
attending.  No Republicans attended.  Frank invited Laura
O'Callaghan, Vice-President and Katherine Berry, Election
Director to the June CC Dems club meeting.

Intern:  Catherine has written a detailed analysis of
Carroll County politics.

Voter Registration at CCC:  Mitch and Anita manned the
table.  The main advantage of doing this is to maintain our
presence; however, they found that lunch hour is not the
best time to talk politics.

Charter:  No update.

Frederick JJ dinner:  There were 260 people in attendance.
Frank, Corynne, and Anita attended.

New Business

Fall breakfast:  The breakfast will be in October, close to
the general election.

Headquarters:  To be discussed after the Victory dinner.

Officer elections: Vote will be in the fall.

Forum:  To be discussed after the primary.

The meeting adjourned at 8:40.

Our next meeting will be May 12.

Respectfully submitted,

Dorothy Scanlan Recording Secretary, CCDCC