There has been a lot going on at the MassGOP and I want to give you all a brief update. First, we have been strengthening town committees by empowering them with better tools and technology. We offer town committees a way to get online quickly at no cost with a personalized logo (and we encourage them to do so). Voter vault, a tool primarily reserved for campaigns, has now been given to town committee chairs as a tool to build the committee. Town committees are not social clubs waiting around for Republicans to knock on their door – we are community organizations that are active and voter vault enables you to recruit and identify new members. We have had success across Massachsuetts; from Dalton to Somerville, Reading to Nantucket, town committees are more sophisticated in their outreach. This is the essential core of our party. Vibrant town committees mean not just more candidates, but better candidates. Vibrant town committees mean more activists to help the campaigns with volunteer work. Vibrant town committees mean more data and more registered voters. Vibrant town committees mean more watchdogs on the Democrat incumbents to hold them accountable for their liberal voting records. Vibrant town committees mean Republicans active in their local community, making a difference. Vibrant town committees now, will mean a stronger Republican party in the future. Our number 1 targeted town without an existing town committee, has recently been organized. Our Action Packet has been a huge success – the party used to send out a 90 page manual for town committees to read. We scrapped this verbose guide and drafted our 13 page Action Packet, consisting of 15 bullet points that the committees can be doing right now.
The current crop of Republican candidates, although not large, is one of the best the party has seen in recent memory. These candidates have great backgrounds as members of their community and they have been attending our trainings.
Speaking of which, the party has done a record amount of trainings (with a staff 1/3 the size as it was in 2006) with over 12 trainings in 2007. In 2008 we have already logged in 10 trainings with more to come. Do not assume that all trainings are equal. Gone are the days of powerpoint slides with ham sandwiches, potato salad concluding with a paper packet of the slides as you walk out the door. We are bringing the RNC style of training across Massachusetts. Our trainings are interactive with a hands-on approach. You don't just learn about voter id, you do voter id. You don't hear about door knocking, you print out precinct walking lists. You don't watch a few slides on voter vault, you log in and use voter vault. You don't hear how to blog, you build your own blog. We want you to roll up your sleeves and complete the process from beginning to end. The goal is to have you leave the training, not with vague concepts, but with real skills and knowledge. We have opened up a training center at the MassGOP HQ in Boston for any town committee or campaign to rent. Just give us a date and time and we will have a personalized training prepared for your town or district. We have 6 computers available in the training center but you can bring laptops and tap into our wireless.
We are about to roll out some important issues that we want to fight for. The Issues Committee has met once, and will soon meet again to develop this platform. To date, the trainings have been my favorite part of the job because it's quantifiable progress – real skills are being taught. But we need to couple these skills with a reason to fight and the Issues Committee will soon develop a Massachusetts-centric platform. This is the whole reason that I got into politics and it's an exciting time to be Growing Our Party in Massachusetts.
Finally, we have a great group of interns this summer and they will be communicating with you on MassRoots about their projects. See Liz Grimm's post below. These interns are the future leaders of the Republican Party and we are lucky to have them.
If you have any questions or concerns – compliments or complaints – send them to our opinion line at GOPinions@massgop.com and we would love to hear from you. We have already received a lot of feedback and it's a great way for the grassroots to speak directly to the MassGOP headquarters in Boston.
-Rob
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