Greetings Conservatives!

Next SJC Republican Party Event:

SJI, July 15th, 2 pm

@ Earthbox conference room in F.H. 

Speaker Ed Kilduff:

hydrologist and water issues expert

The Hirst decision allows government entities to block the drilling of wells if the well could conceivably impact local streams or rivers. The broadness of this ruling has had a chilling effect on rural development. It is nothing less than an assault on rural living. We look forward to hearing Mr. Kilduff’s remarks on this subject and the issue of water in general. We have covered the Hirst decision in some detail here.

We are working to organize events on Lopez and Orcas over the summer as well, so please don’t feel forgotten if you live on Orcas or Lopez!

A Note on our New Email Server

This week I helped my grandmother with her email because she was having trouble finding the important emails from her family because she was deluged with other emails. I deleted spam email after spam email and hit “unsubscribe” over and over. I did the same with another relative. It reminded me how much I hate spam. I never want to be spam. If you do not wish to receive this email please click unsubscribe at the bottom of this email or drop me an email as sjcrpchair@gmail.com.

I hope you find these emails worth your time: I try not to overburden your inbox, and we don’t share your email address with anybody else. Only two members of the executive board have access to the list. If you have comments feel free to drop me an email. They do get to me! We have had a tremendous response to this newsletter and many people have reached out to me over it. Thank you for your support!

The 45th Legislative District

Some of you may be aware that the seat left by the late State Senator Andy Reid is going to have a special election. Because control of the state senate is so close, this election effectively decides which party will control the state senate. Seattle Times reports.

This week GOP candidate Jinyoung Lee Englund was the first candidate to reach the $500,000 in donation mark. Candidate Englund’s husband is an active duty service member, and she’s from Woodinville Washington — where I was raised!

She remarked: “I am blown away by the outpouring of support from people of all walks of life,” said Englund. “People understand that each dollar donated to help us win puts us closer to lowering car tab fees, preventing a new state income tax from being imposed on us, and holding Olympia accountable to steward our hard-earned tax dollars wisely.” You can read more about this on her website here, and we covered this in some detail on our website here.

If you want to do something to help sway the political situation in our state, supporting candidate Englund is a great campaign to support.

Local and State News Digest:

I do not necessarily endorse the things I post here, I post them because I hope conservatives will speak out for conservative principles. Being informed is an important step towards that. There is a full listing of local newspaper contacts on our webpage here. If you notice an outdated link please let me know. Many of the links are sent to me by others — please consider sending me your links to sjcrpchair@gmail.com.

Last week we mentioned a letter in the Journal by Republican PCO and contractor Barry Cave about tiny homes (what is a PCO? click here). This week the Journal ran an editorial advocating for zoning changes to permit tiny homes, and the Journal ran a full feature on the subject by Hayley Day (also in Islands Weekly here). This isn’t something everyone agrees on, but it’s an interesting problem and it’s nice to see people trying to find inventive solutions.

A few weeks ago I covered in detail the affordable housing conversation in SJC.

There was a letter in the Sounder advocating against the proposed vacation house permit tax.

There have been a lot of letters in the paper over the last few weeks defending public lands, as an example, this week in the Sounder. This would be another area for conservatives to write about to the paper.

“Comment on draft plan for Mount Ben Preserve” on June 29th. Journal reports.

“WSF to hold four public meetings about proposed rate increase,” Sounder reports and Islands Weekly reports.

Lopez library seeking a new board member. Islands Weekly reports.

County Calendar: 

SJC Council Monday Meeting
June 26, 2017, 9:00 AM @ Council Hearing Room

SJCPHD #1 Board Meeting
June 28, 2017,5:00 p.m. @ 55 Second Street, Friday Harbor, WA.

Solid Waste Advisory Committee Meeting
June 29, 2017, 8:30 AM - 10:30 AM @ Large Legislative Conference Room

Board of Equalization Hearings
June 29, 2017, 9:15 AM @ Council Hearing Room

Building Advisory Council Meeting
June 29, 2017, 11:45 AM - 1:00 PM @ Large Legislative Conference Room

Veterans Advisory Board Meeting
June 30, 2017, 11:45 AM - 1:45 PM @ Large Legislative Conference Room

Greetings Conservatives

In light of the recent attacks

We wish to first express our sincerest condolences to those affected

We reiterate that the SJC Republican Party is open for business.

Although this is a very liberal county, we reiterate that we are publicly willing to stand behind our membership in the Republican Party

Nathan Butler (SJI) — Chairman

nathanaelbutler@gmail.com   (c) 360-298-4489

Lynda Lee Gerpheide (Lopez) — Vice Chair

Alex Gavora (SJI) — Treasurer

Cindy Carter (Orcas) — State Committeewoman

Rick Boucher (Orcas) — State Committeeman

Minnie Knych (SJI) — Secretary

Welcome to our New Newsletter! 

This week we completed a major update of our mailing list. If you are receiving this for the first time, that may be why. It includes collected data from the Lincoln Day event, Caucus, membership dues, and more. In light of the shootings this week it seems a propitious time for this update: we want to tell as many people as possible that we are here, and that we are serious about conservative principles.

That said, if you wish to unsubscribe, please email me at sjcrpchair@gmail.com. I will remove you, no questions asked. You can see examples of the newsletters that I send out weekly (rarely more) from last week, the week before, or just scroll through our website sjcrp.org. It typically has one or two discussion topics, a listing of local and state news, and a county calendar. This is an unusually long newsletter, most are much shorter.

Announcing our Next Event: July 15th, SJI

I am very happy to announce that our next event will be on Saturday July 15th. It will be at Earthbox in Friday Harbor (which does have AC, for those who are curious). We are fortunate to have Ed Kilduff speak to us. He cleared his schedule to make sure he was available.

Mr. Kilduff is a hydrologist, board member of Community Treasures, and has spoken on the radio and at other events on water issues in WA state. In light of the Hirst decision this seems a good choice. It will be a great time to get together as conservatives and learn something while we’re at it. It marks our commitment to being more active in our community, and to hold more events.

Please mark the date! More details forthcoming.

“Sanctuary County” and the San Juans

Our State Committeeman Rick Boucher was in the ferry line waiting to go to the legislative district meeting this week and had the following encounter: “I went to the Dump on Orcas last Sunday afternoon. A Gal was there collecting signatures. It appeared that at each vehicle to approach the pay booth she approached and asked the following question while the driver was waiting to move forward.

“I’ll make this real simple for you.  Do you support the immigration policies of President Trump?”  I said, “Yes.”

She said, “Then I don’t want to talk to you.” And walked away.  I was not presented with the petition to sign.” [end]

Sure enough, this week in the Islands Weekly: “Immigrant Rights Group protects local immigrants.” Firstly, this is highly misleading. They may be trying to protect illegal immigrants, which is not the same thing as “local immigrants.” I know this because many legal immigrants came to our Lincoln Day dinners and talked to me. Nobody dislikes illegal immigration more than legal immigrants. Much like affirmative action, it casts a pall on those who legitimately succeed.

It would be nice to see some pushback from conservatives on this issue.

On this subject, a Bill Clinton video has been circulating through conservative email and social media. (CPAN). The instructions are “Donald Trump should just televise this Bill Clinton speech from 1995 and then simply state “I’m Donald Trump and I approve this message…” Not one word of commentary needs to be added.” It’s a very short video, about 84 seconds.

Local and State News Digest

We have a listing of local news sources on the website here, including emails for editors to submit letters. It was updated this week. For those of you who are new, my posting a link here does not mean I endorse the article. In fact, many times I post them specifically so that Republicans can reply to them.

Michelle Loftus posted on our website “Want to make more for doing less? Ask Planned Parenthood how,” and “Why the ACLU and Democrats are targeting Catholic Hospitals.”

County Council OKs Clure property purchase by San Juan County Land Bank (Journal of the San Juans, in the Sounder here and Islands Weekly here). Note also the Trails Committee minutes here.

Some county education and health services may move off island (Journal of the San Juans).

Our own PCO Barry Cave had a letter published on the affordable housing debate. (Journal of the San Juans).

County officials discuss how to protect orcas (Sounder reports).

Opposition to Kinder-Morgan oil pipeline in a letter here. (Sounder, also in the Journal here).

Sea level rise in the San Juans (Islands Weekly).

Attorney Steve Brandli applies to be San Juan County Superior Court Judge (Islands Weekly)

Want to pay more income tax? Seattle is considering its very own income tax for those who just love taxes. Does anybody want to guess how long it will take for the threshold to be lowered? (Seattle Times reports)

A teenager had his Trump t-shirt photoshopped out in his yearbook photo. It just goes to show how negatively the left views Trump: they are treating support for President Trump as hate speech or a racist slogan. Amazing, really. I usually avoid national news since it’s better covered elsewhere, but I couldn’t resist posting this. I appreciated that USA Today covered this.

The Seattle Times ran an article this week about illegal immigrants using WA State to get into Canada.

County Calendar 

Marine Resources Sub-Committee Meeting
June 21, 2017, 8:30 AM - 10:30 AM @ Meetings on even numbered months are held at Islanders Bank annex, Friday Harbor; odd numbered months are held at the County meeting room at Orcas Landing

Board of Health Meeting
June 21, 2017, 11:30 AM - 1:30 PM @ Council Hearing Room

Marine Resources Executive Sub-Committee Meeting
June 22, 2017, 11:30 AM - 1:30 PM @ Small Legislative Conference Room

Building Advisory Council Meeting
June 22, 2017, 11:45 AM - 1:00 PM @ Large Legislative Conference Room

SJCPHD #1 Special Meeting/Work Session
June 23, 2017, 2:00 pm @ Frank Wilson Memorial EMS Building

SJCPHD #1 Board Meeting 
June 28, 2017, starting at 5:00 p.m. @ 55 Second Street, Friday Harbor, WA.

State Initiative I-552

I received this email from “Just Want Privacy,” an advocacy group:

“Dear San Juan County Republicans,

On May 20th the Washington State Republican Party passed a resolution stating:

“Be it resolved that the Washington State Republican Party calls on all Washington state voters to sign and gather signatures to certify initiative 1552 before the July 7thdeadline.”

Our State needs to gather 330,000 signatures supporting this petition by July 1st to place this initiative on the November ballot.  Divide that number by 39 counties, and each county needs to get approximately 8,400 signatures….but 1,600 signatures from   San Juan County  would be wonderful!

If each Republican accepts the challenge of gathering signatures then we can have a great impact in this important issue that will bless our community for years to come!

Here is the challenge:  Will each GoP member take responsibility to fill out 1 full petition page (20 signatures on each page.)?    We know some  will get more and some will get less; that is completely acceptable.  Remember every signature counts!!”

I have placed the full article on our website here. For Just Want Privacy’s website, go here. We need people who are willing to help organize this.