Urgent Alert re: City of Mt Shasta's community rights group

This urgent alert was sent out yesterday from Global Exchange’s “Organizing for Community Rights” project, which I encourage all of you to subscribe to by clicking HERE. It’s edited by Shannon Biggs. There are a number of actions that we can ALL take in the next few days that may have significant impact on the outcome of this political fight.

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It has been a busy week in [the town of] Mt. Shasta, and we need your help to restore their democratic right to VOTE on community rights this November.

The people of Mt. Shasta supporting Measure A have a simple goal: to assert their right to control their own lives and livelihoods. Despite this noble intention, they have met resistance, facing nearly every possible barrier throughout the process of bringing the measure to the ballot.

Citizen-driven Measure A asks whether or not the 3,500 residents have the right to protect local water from corporate water bottlers and to stop weather manipulation (chemical cloud seeding) from energy corporation, PG&E. The question is whether important decisions that directly affect the health, safety and welfare of the community belong to citizens or corporations.

And now the issue is: why is Measure A, an ordinance fundamentally about democratic local self-governance, being stripped from the ballot?

In partnership with Global Exchange and CELDF, residents put an ordinance on the ballot this November that bans corporate cloud seeding and bulk water extraction and places community (and nature's) rights above corporate interests.

Yet, in a surprise move August 12, County Clerk Colleen Setzer threw Measure A off the ballot, claiming it had been filed in the wrong office and also citing a one sentence difference between the initiative filed with the City and the version petitioners signed.  However, the previous week the City Council had already voted unanimously to leave Measure A on the ballot, because the error, the result of a clerical mistake, did not change the meaning or intent of the initiative in any way.

As Mt. Shasta Community Rights Project spokesperson, Ami Marcus said, "After nearly two years of work by dozens of volunteers, gathering petition signatures of over more than 1/3 of the registered voters, and more than 200 public statements of support at City Council meetings, Measure A was killed by the stroke of Setzer's pen."

With help from Global Exchange and CELDF, the Mt. Shasta Community Rights Project filed an elections complaint to restore Measure A to the 2010 general election ballot. The elections complaint contends that County Clerk Setzer acted improperly and illegally in taking Measure A off the ballot.  The City Council has reaffirmed that the fate of Measure A is a City-not a County issue.

Who stands to gain by stripping Mt. Shasta's right to decide? Whose agenda is being served?

Measure A is a matter of restoring decision making power to the hands of the community, rather than the hands of corporate executives. Who Decides: people or corporations? This question is for all of our communities to determine.  Please support Mt. Shasta in standing up for their rights AND yours:

1)  Make a donation to support the legal fight to restore Measure A HERE. We must stand up for their rights, as they stand for ours.

2)  Volunteer to help with the campaign, or write a letter to the editor of the Mt. Shasta Herald, or your own local media. Please contact Julianne Stelmaszyk at stelmaszyk.j@gmail.com or shannon@globalexchange.org for more information on ways to help.

With your help we can win.

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A late update:

The Mt Shasta News has published related stories worth noting:

County Clerk Revokes Measure A, August 13, 2010. And from that page you can link to a 7-page PDF of the official notice from the County Clerk as to why she rejected the ballot initiative.

Guest Opinion: Measure A Opponents "Shocked", August 18, 2010

Measure A Appeal Seeks Return to November Ballot, August 25, 2010

The full text of the proposed Community Water Rights and Self Governance ordinance

Report on the Voter Initiative Petition Ordinance from the Mt Shasta City Attorney