AFSCME Council 5 Convention - September 30 - October 2

I'm headed to the AFSCME Council 5 Convention this afternoon.  We'll be meeting at the Sheraton Hotel in Bloomington.  I'm serving on the Credentials Committee, and will be working at the Registration table, both this evening from 6-9pm and in the morning, from 7-9:30am.

I am a candidate for a Council 5 Executive Board seat representing the County Sector.  Nominations are being held Thursday afternoon, with voting in the evening.

Here's the Convention notice from the Council 5 website:

http://afscmemn.org/it%E2%80%99s-convention-time%21


And here's the Convention schedule, including speeches by Gubernatorial candidate Mark Dayton on Saturday morning, and from retired International Secretary-Treasurer, Bill Lucy, a great favorite of the Minnesota delegation to this summer's convention in Boston.


Convention Opens Sept. 30Council 5’s annual convention runs Sept. 30-Oct. 2 at the Sheraton Bloomington hotel. Here is an outline of major events (subject to change):

• Registration: Sept. 29, 6-9 p.m., and Sept. 30, 7-9:30 a.m. (Note: Delegates not registered by this time cannot vote in Council 5 elections)
• Convention opens: Sept. 30, 9 a.m.
• Sector and District nomination meetings: Sept. 30, 1:15-3 p.m.
• Policy committee meetings: Sept. 30, 3:15-5:15 p.m.
• Elections of Officers and Executive Board: Sept. 30, 5:15-7:15 p.m.
• Training and workshops: Oct. 1, 8:30-11:45 a.m.
• District meetings, Oct. 1, 1:30-2:15 p.m.
• Convention reconvenes: Oct. 1, 2:30 p.m., including address by Bill Lucy, AFSCME International’s secretary-treasurer emeritus 
• Convention reconvenes: Oct. 2, 9 a.m., including address by Mark Dayton, AFSCME-endorsed candidate for governor

Second Weekend of Door-to-Door & Literature Drop Completed

This was an interesting weekend.

• I did door-to-door campaigning in the neighborhood just off of Bunker Lake Blvd., and ran into Mayor Mike Gamache at one of the homes. 
• I actually fell on Sunday - I caught some loose sand, and felt my feet flipping out from under me.  Fortunately, nothing damaged, but my pride.
• I've had some interesting conversations, including with one landlord who is upset that the absentee owners of other properties off 138th & Xavis aren't being held to take better care of their yards and property - some of those places did look shabby.  Another wanted to know more about the city's water & sewer replacement work on Xavis - and the newly-tarred road and new curbing was clearly visible.  I also spoke with an engaging Andover resident, who is a native of Liberia, and shared some of my concerns about how we can provide a more complete presence in Andover, with choices in town for trestaurants and other amenities, instead of driving to Anoka, Riverdale and Blaine to find these places. 
• I have a great wife and partner.  We got out for about 5 hours this weekend, and did campaign literature drops in Precincts 7, 8 and 10, east of Hanson Blvd.  We probably placed literature at close to 900 homes this weekend.  I drive and Cheryl puts the campaign cards in the newspaper or direct marketing boxes - when they have them, or we use blue painter's tape to attach them to the posts at homes that only have mailboxes.  We try to respect folks by using the painter's tape, to prevent any tearing off of paint.  Cheryl has a process figured out, and it helped that these neighborhoods were very concentrated with homes.
• This hadn't been our original weekend plan - but Digital Printing in New Hope still has not completed my lawn signs.  So instead of trying to put up signs this weekend, we campaigned.  I purchased the signs August 26th.  It took three tries to get an acceptable proof OK'd on September 7.  The signs were supposed to be done in two weeks - by the 21st.  Then they were supposed to be done Friday night or Saturday morning.  But there was no 3rd shift on Friday and no cutters on Saturday, so now I'm looking at Tuesday.  And, I'll be tied up Wednesday afternoon through Saturday morning at the AFSCME Council 5 Convention, so except for a little time on Tuesday ( I hope) and Wednesday morning, I won't get some signs out until next weekend.  Darn.
• One opponent - Tony Howard - put lawn signs out this weekend.  They look nice.  Tony, who's active in the Andover Youth Hockey Associatiion is using a variation of the Andover school colors - black & gold.  Tony's campaign is also on Facebook now, and he has a new web site up and running.
• I went in for a haircut trim Saturday noon, and through some miscommunication and bad info in the computer, I came out with a much shorter haircut than I've worn throughout my adult life.  Cheryl thinks it looks nice - but, I've felt out-of-sorts because it just doesn't look like me, and with the Convention and the campaign, the last thing I wanted to deal with was self-image.  It'll be OK, but it's unfortunate, and unfortunate it had to happen just now.