Greetings from the glamourous(?) San Fernando Valley of California, home of the entertainment industry and almost a million and a half residents. The SFV is mostly part of the city of Los Angeles but also includes the smaller cities of Burbank, Glendale and San Fernando. The Valley has changed a lot since the days of the Brady Bunch; it has become very diverse and much more of a Democratic voting powerhouse. Today we are having a "Rally in the Valley" (which is what all GOTV rallies get called around here, naturally) starting at 1:30PM. Details below the fold...
The Democratic Party of the San Fernando Valley (aka DP/SFV) is a local grassroots organization made up of about two dozen Democratic clubs. We have a very active campaign headquarters where we call hundreds of thousands of voters (400,000 or so in 2008) and walk hundreds of precincts.
Today we will be joined by most of the CA statewide Democratic candidates including the once and future Governor of CA, current Attorney General Jerry Brown. Yesterday it was also confirmed that our excellent U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer will be with us. Secretary of State Debra Bowen and Controller John Chiang, two outstanding public servants running for re-election, will also be with us. We will even have the two San Franciscans on the ticket at the office, Mayor Gavin Newsom (running for Lt Gov) and District Attorney Kamala Harris (running for Attorney General). There will also be many of our local elected officials including Rep. Brad Sherman and several state legislators including semi-local Assembly Speaker John Perez (from the other part of L.A. southeast of the mountains.)
The Rally in the Valley is scheduled for 1:30 to 3:30 this afternoon at the DP/SFV headquarters, 7221 Van Nuys Blvd in Van Nuys (in the middle of the SFV and my hometown). It is in the Albertson's shopping center just north of the northwest corner of Van Nuys Blvd and Sherman Way (in the former Hollywood Video space). If you are coming by freeway it is about a mile east of the Sherman Way exit off the 405 or four miles north of the Van Nuys Blvd exit off the 101. There are buses along both Van Nuys and Sherman Way. Our office phone number is (818)995-DEMS.
It is a great opportunity to meet the candidates but this is all about Getting Out The Vote. We can win the elections if we get our supporters to vote. We don't want Queen Meg or Carly FAILorina to win, do we? (To paraphrase John Boner, "Hell no, we don't!"). If you can come to the event that is great but it is more important to help out in the last nine days to GOTV. If you are anywhere near here we have plenty for you to do (we are open every day until Election Day), but if not then you should get involved in your community. The election is not over until it is over, and that hasn't happened yet.
Democratically Yours, Zack from the SFV