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Re: Don't bother with ACLU tonite; apologies for Satlow's insincere invitation



Evan, I'll apologize again, as I did yesterday, for giving you the misimpression you could give a short presentation on this issue; or maybe I thought so at the time.  I have been in the middle of some urgent legal cases, besides my participation in revising the ACLU proposal for a change in the Boulder occupancy rules, which was the focus of our annual meeting last night.  In fact, I did announce the commissioners' meeting, partly because Jean Gore was there to discuss it (although she said she would have come anyway; I would have done the same if you had been there).  We discussed the unlikelihood that the commissioners would do anything but approve the contract, probably 2-1, with Danish on our side; but I suggested that having people keep pressure on the commissioners might at least push them to lobby the legislature (and I suppose the Secy. of State) to change the statute (and SOS interpretation) on recounting the same way the ballots were originally counted. 
 
By the way, Simon is not on the state board and I don't think ever has been.  He used to be intake director of the Colorado ACLU and is on the Boulder chapter board.  He will probably be our chapter representative to the state board after our board election and the election of officers by the board.  I am surprised I did not interrupt him; that is a longstanding bad habit of mine.
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Tuesday, April 27, 2004 9:31 AM
Subject: RE: Don't bother with ACLU tonite; apologies for Satlow's insincere invitation

Evan:

Sorry you got the wrong impression from Barry - the annual meeting last night had a pre-scheduled program with invited speakers on the issue of ending discrimination against same-sex couples in Boulder's occupancy ordinance. And  - We may have indeed come up with a good compromise to get this done.

But we did not have time to take on other issues last night - so don't take Barry saying you could not speak as a slight to you or the electronic voting issue.

We have done lots of work to object to the county's decision to purchase the electronic voting system - I spoke at the commissioners meeting, others from our Board have appeared and raised objections, Joe Pezillo gave a presentation to our Board and we endorsed his objections, we have aligned with Bob McGrath, have asked the state ACLU to review this, etc.  I don't think we are lacking information or advocacy on this issue.

You know, Evan, despite all the differences and disputes you have had with the ACLU - remember that we are all just a bunch of volunteers who are trying to do good things  - we may come at it from different approaches, but in the end, we are all generally of the same mind on civil liberties and open government issues.  assigning bad motives to misunderstanding or perhaps just inattention doesn't advance our causes much -

Regards,


Judd

----Original Message Follows----
From: Evan Daniel Ravitz <evan@xxxxxxxx>
To: cvv-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Barry Satlow <bsat@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Don't bother with ACLU tonite; apologies for Satlow's insincere invitation
Date: Mon, 26 Apr 2004 18:40:57 -0600 (MDT)


Citizens for Verifiable Voting folks, I hope you don't waste your
time going to the ACLU meeting tonight. Barry Satlow told me
Thursday we could address the multitudes -since it is their annual
meeting.

But tonight I remembered how I wasted 2 hours to talk 2 minutes last
time I went to a regular ACLU meeting, and how Chair Barry Satlow
interrupted or just spoke during everyone else's attempts to talk,
except one: Simon Mole, who ranks on the State Board.

I called Barry just now, and sure enough, he had no intention of
talking about voting systems tonight, or letting us do so, as he'd
led me to believe Thursday.

I have plenty else to say about the current Boulder ACLU, but I quit
their Board long ago and am done with it.

Our petition is going swimmingly, which you can see at:

http://www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?hand&1

Last I checked, after 48 hours 121 have volunteered to hand count
the 2004 election.

Evan

------------------------------------------------------
Evan Ravitz 303 440 6838 evan@xxxxxxxx
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