Deanna Dee-Dee Taylor

The Green Party of Utah (GPUT) lost ballot access in November, 2004.
The GPUT began its petition drive November 22, 2004 and submitted its first batch of petitions to the state elections office in February, 2005.
The GPUT formed its non-profit “Green Party of Utah, Inc.” in January of 2005 and trademarked the name on April 6, 2005, as a result of the party website being hijacked and indications that a rival group was going to incorporate the name and the party (which ultimately was attempted by the rival group.).
The rival group, consisting of suspended members (see FAQs at GPUT FAQs) and a never-before-heard-of infiltrator, submitted its first batch of petitions on April 8, 2005 to the elections office illegally using the GPUT’s name.

The Director of Elections has stated that his office will remain silent on the issue of national affiliation, incorporation, and trademark, even though it is against the law in Utah to use or allow the use of an incorporatated and trademarked name. The Director of Elections has stated that the first “group” to complete its petition drive gets the name on the ballot.

This means that I can submit a petition under the name “Coca-Cola” or “The LDS Church Party” and get away with it!

Humor aside, here is a post that came into the GPUS national discussion list early this morning:
——————————————–
Date: Wed, 31 Aug 2005 02:12:31 -0400
From: “Steve Greenfield” <email deleted>
Subject: [usgp-dx] New Utah Green Party certification
To:

Steve Greenfield
New Paltz, NY

——————————————–

Mr. Greenfield’s assertions are incorrect. Precedent has been set by Missouri, where a similar situation occured, and the party in that state recognized by the GPUS is called Progressive Party of Missouri.

The GPUT has the history with the GPUS. The GPUT‘s secretary possesses all the party’s records from the date of its inception. The GPUT has a legally functioning non-profit arm, “Green Party of Utah” and is protected under Utah Commerce Laws. The GPUT is active, doing outreach, is building coalitions and participating in community endeavors. The GPUT has delegates that are engaged and involved.

The GPUT is currently researching options including taking legal action to protect its name from this unauthorized use.

The Green Party of Utah will move forward with completing its petition drive for the ballot line and will move forward with running candidates in 2006.

Britain is in the planning stages of confronting its massive traffic problem – more on that below. But first:

I have been fuming over the fact that my bus route has been discontinued on the road right in front of my house. The bus route covered about 6 miles, traveling from the Sandy TRAX (light rail) station to the Murray Central TRAX station. I live about halfway between the two and had become accustomed to taking it to the Murray station, taking the train to another bus stop and then taking that bus to within walking distance of my workplace. There are many older folks still working who used this bus route to travel to work as well.

I have been talking to lots of folks about this and other mass transit issues and folks are in general agreement that Greens need to take the lead in advocating more bus routes, more rail lines, more shuttles to the train stations, etc. One of the problems I see currently is that UTA (Utah Transit Authority) defacto encourages people to use their cars by virtue of the fact that there are **huge** parking lots at the train stations – for FREE! If folks had to pay for parking lot use, they’d use the bus more and bus routes would not be cut.

In today’s Utah Policy, LaVarr Web has written in his Tuesday Buzz an article entitled Transportation Watch- British Look at ‘Road Pricing’. It looks like Britain is examining the concept of charging motorists to use its highways. Utah is looking very closely at this and will likely be charging tolls on new highways. This is a baby step in the right direction, but we have a long way to go. I personally feel that mass transit should be totally subsidized and that the concept of having it be profitable should be thrown out the window. Profit is not the bottom line here.

In the same column there is an article entitled, Commuter Rail Groundbreaking, which will occur today in Weber County, for a 44 mile light rail system to be completed in 2008.

I will be following the British system progress and Utah’s examination of it and advocating that our local Green Party assume a high profile in this issue.

Today is the first day of classes for the students in the school I teach – City Academy, a progressive charter school. We teachers have spent the last two weeks in meetings and moving into our rooms.

I teach music, yearbook and special ed language arts. We have about 140 students in grades 7-12.

Our director wrote a commentary to an article from the Salt Lake Tribune’s August 6 edition (Study: Charters teach for less – I tried to locate it but I have to pay to access past articles….). Her commentary,
Utah charter schools – just the facts, touches upon some of the myths from that article.

I’m sure I’ll be posting items from my teaching experiences here from time to time…..

Off we go!

Friday’s Salt Lake Tribune published an article entitled Rocky’s fallout: From threats to pats on back Bad for business? , A firm’s co-owner says the outspoken mayor made them shy away from SLC, in which it is stated that a the co-owner of The Florida based firm LexJet Corp,Ron Simkins, which had planned to bring at least 100 jobs to SLC, backed out because of SLC Mayor Rocky Anderson’s open position on the war and George W. Bush.

Simkins said the firm had been waivering between SLC and Denver and when Mayor Anderson spoke out, I said, ‘Great, it’s Denver.’ It’s [the mayor’s] job to represent his community, not to throw down a gauntlet in front of the president.”

Yesterday at the Muslim Festival we Greens spoke with a spokesperson from Mayor Anderson’s office who said that this was a “fake story”, that the firm was planning to go to Denver from the beginning and they were just waiting for an opportunity like this to create the image that Mayor Anderson was the cause for their decision. The spokesperson said that there should be a retraction in the paper. I haven’t seen it yet.

Some of us speculate that Karl Rove may be behind this…..contacting Republican business owners considering moves to Utah, as well as those already doing business in Utah, and urging them to report to newspapers that because of Rocky Anderson’s criticism of George W. Bush they would no longer consider SLC as a place for their businesses.

In the 92 degree heat of the desert, citizens came out to participate in the third annual Salt Lake American Muslim Festival. SLC Mayor Rocky Anderson issued a proclomation to mark today as the official Salt Lake City American Muslim Festival Day, in honor of the diversity of Salt Lake City.

The Green Party of Utah tabled at this event and networked with a lot of people. The GPUT was invited by the Muslim Forum to participate in its November Conference at the University of Utah.

Here are some photos of the event:

Green Party of Utah Table

Other booths

Entertainers and speakers

Peter Carroon, Salt Lake County Mayor

Mark Alvarez, spokesperson for Mayor Rocky Anderson

Ghulam Hasnain, primary organizer for the Festival

Utah Governor’s spokesperson for the Office of Diversity

David Litvack, Elected Representive for the downtown SLC district

Mahan Khalsa, Utahns for Just Peace in the Holy Land

More entertianment, tables, and photos of festival goers