By Sheli DeLaney and Fariba Nourian
The beginning—a handful of good quality beans
Coffee Party USA was formed by Annabel Park and Eric Byler in March 2010 because they were frustrated by the vitriolic rhetoric surrounding the healthcare reform debate and the incessant media coverage of the Tea Party. Coffee Party USA and Coffee Party Cincinnati (or CPC) were launched simultaneously, along with countless other chapters across the nation, as part of a national call to join the Coffee Party movement. The first meeting of Coffee Party Cincinnati was held March 13, 2010 at the Coffee Emporium in Over-the-Rhine. At this meeting and a number of others that soon followed, a collection of few hundred individuals came to show their interest in Coffee Party Cincinnati.
What is the Coffee Party? As spokespeople for Coffee Party Cincinnati (CPC), we get that question all the time. Coffee Party USA has a long definition and mission statement that can be read at their website: www.coffeepartyusa.com. However, CPC is a local chapter, and we define ourselves as follows: a non-partisan grassroots political organization that was created to be a venue for people who are disenchanted with two-party politics and want to work toward positive solutions, civility in political discourse, government accountability, removing corporate influence from politics, and making government the expression of our collective will.
First steps—getting ground
Spring 2010: After the launch, a dedicated group of local Coffee Party enthusiasts began to meet regularly. One of the first things we did was celebrate the passage of the healthcare reform bill. On April 30, we threw a party at Red Polly in Northside to say thank you to Steve Driehaus, Ohio representative from the first congressional district, for voting in favor of the healthcare bill. Rep. Driehaus attended the party where he gave a talk, answered questions, and mingled enthusiastically with the crowd.
Summer 2010: Our next focus was immigration reform. Throughout the summer, Coffee Party organizers hosted numerous screenings of 9500 Liberty, a documentary about immigration policy that was filmed by Coffee Party USA co-founders Annabel Park and Eric Byler. In this documentary, a rural county in Virginia becomes “ground zero in America’s explosive battle over immigration policy when elected officials adopt a law requiring police officers to question anyone they have ‘probable cause’ to suspect is an undocumented immigrant.” See the entire film online at http://www.9500liberty.com/.
Also over the summer, we made a big effort to establish and widen our local network of followers. We set a standing meeting date for the second Thursday of every month, usually held at a neighborhood coffee house. In addition to our email listserve with over 100 individuals and a Facebook page with 1,238 followers, we established a blog and a Twitter account. However, the biggest networking news is that we purchased the domain coffeepartycincinnati.com, which will be launched sometime in 2011! While the website is currently under construction, all the other forms of social media are active and up-to-date. Please see all our contact information and where to find meeting information at the bottom of this article.
Maintaining momentum—percolating cheerfully
September 2010: The first Coffee Party USA National Convention was held in Louisville, KY September 28-30. One dedicated CPC member attended the convention and brought us back a thorough report.
October 2010: An Early Vote Rally was held in front of the Hamilton County courthouse on October 4. CPC members joined others from a variety of organizations to encourage eligible voters to take advantage of Ohio’s special laws that allow early voting throughout the month of October. We also used this opportunity to register Hamilton County voters, and distribute the first draft of our voter’s guide.
On October 30, CPC attended a satellite rally in Cincinnati in support of the hugely successful Rally to Restore Sanity in Washington DC put on by political satirists Jon Stewart (host of The Daily Show) and Stephen Colbert (host of The Colbert Report). Coffee Party USA had a large contingent at the rally.
November 2010: For the midterm elections in November, we published an offical Coffee Party voters guide for Hamilton County, OH. We distributed this through our social media outlets and local coffee houses. On Election Day, we personally handed out our guide at a few polling locations around town. Although it did not seem to make a big impact in the midterm elections, we were not discouraged.
Bitter brew brings new crew
Winter 2010: The events of fall made it apparent that coffee was not the beverage of choice for many voters. After the disappointment of losing out to tea in midterm elections, meeting attendance rose sharply. Livened by the espresso shot of enthusiasm from new members, we decided to choose a new direction for CPC. The group voted to focus our efforts on jail overcrowding—a big problem locally as well as nationally, with negative effects on both the budget and society. By focusing on jail overcrowding locally and the prison industrial complex nationally, we hope to partner with other organizations to find solutions and impact policy. One of our first targets was the marijuana ordinance implemented in the city of Cincinnati in 2006, which made possession of marijuana a level 4 misdemeanor. This ordinance is widely viewed as a waste of city resources with little benefit for fighting crime. CPC called its members to action in the form of a letter campaign to city council members to ask them to repeal this ordinance.
Several other events got the attention of CPC this winter. The first was a book signing at City Hall by Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow, which was followed by a panel discussion of experts in civil rights, policy, legal and ex-offender testimonials. A CPC representative attended this event and gave us a report at our December meeting. The second event was a call to reform our criminal justice system, a presentation by the ACLU that was sponsored by the Urban League of Cincinnati. A CPC representative also attended this event and gave a report at the December meeting. Reports of both events can be found on our blog (November 2010 and December 2010). Finally, CPC sent a small contingent to the Stop Kasich Before He Gets Started rally in Columbus on January 8, sponsored by the Defend Ohio Campaign. The rally was a large and enthusiastic protest of Governor Kasich's anti-worker, anti-youth, anti-environmental policies. The video from the rally is also posted on our blog.
Year-old coffee—surprisingly fresh
We would like to announce that the marijuana ordinance was recently repealed for the city of Cincinnati! And while we do not know how much our letter-writing campaign affected this decision, we view it as a major victory for Coffee Party Cincinnati in 2010.
That’s all for our year in review. For the first year of the Coffee Party, we feel we accomplished a lot. We are in it for the long run. It’s important to us that we are here for people when they want to rally around an organization that is working toward positive solutions.
Special thanks—the cream and sugar
Coffee Party Cincinnati would like to give a heartfelt thank you a few of our extra-caffeinated members for their contributions over the past year. First and foremost, we thank our friend Galina for attending the National Coffee Party Convention in Louisville KY this past September. We were very grateful to have a Cincinnati representative at this historic event, and Galina gave us a great report at our monthly meeting about her experience. Next, we would like to thank Justin Jeffre, for bringing our blog to life. He regularly submits superb articles that are informative, attention-getting, controversial, and great for sparking dialogue amongst our readers. Last but not least, we would like to thank Paul Majewski, for purchasing the domain name for our website, and for volunteering to construct our website on his own time and free of charge.
CPC Contact info:
Facebook: Join the Coffee Party Movement, Cincinnati OH
Twitter: Coffeepartycinc
Website: Coffeepartycincinnati.com (under construction)
Meetings: 6pm on 2nd Thursday of every month, location varies (meeting location announced via Facebook, Twitter, and email)
Nice review! I wasn't aware of all of those efforts. It just goes to show that Coffee Party Cincinnati is more active than most of our members probably realize.
ReplyDeleteI didn't notice that you all had just posted this or I would've held off on posting the article I just posted. Doh!