Category: Activism

JOin The Century Club

12/20/2019

What tumultuous times we are living in! While Democrats across our country have worked hard and achieved some victories, such as winning back the House, we still have much more to do to restore balance, strengthen unity and protect our Democracy. As 2019 draws to a close, we must look at what is at stake in the 2020 elections. I think we all would agree that our Freedoms, our Democracy, our National Security, and our very Lives on this planet, are all at stake. The 2020 elections may, in fact, be the most important and consequential elections of our lifetimes!

As we prepare for this exciting election year, we must seize every opportunity to strengthen and expand our outreach to Wilkes County citizens. With our North Carolina Democratic Party, Wilkes Democrats share “Our Carolina Promise”: to Our Schools, putting our teachers and our students first; to Our Health and Safety, protecting our environment, expanding Medicaid and fighting the opioid crisis; to Our Jobs, fighting for equal pay for equal work, rebuilding our infrastructure and an economy that works for everyone; and to Our People, protecting the right to vote, fighting for independent redistricting, and standing for equal rights and protections for all.

To reach these potential Wilkes County voters, we must expand our outreach, strengthen our county precincts, get our friends registered to vote, and assure that they can get to the polls. Your support is vital to make these efforts successful! We need your financial support to help with printing, mailing and advertising costs, keeping our Headquarters open for meetings, training sessions and registration drives, and helping our Democratic candidates win elections. We also need your volunteer support with voter registration drives, phone banking, canvassing, postcard writing, envelope stuffing and more!

We invite you to join the Wilkes County Democratic Party now, or renew your membership for 2020 as a front-line supporter. Your membership at the “Century Club” level of $100 or more entitles you to attend our annual “Century Club” donor appreciation banquet, which will be held on January 18, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express in Wilkesboro. Our keynote speaker will be Mr. Wayne Goodwin, the Chairman of the North Carolina Democratic Party. Other guests, to be announced, may include candidates for 2020 elections for local, North Carolina House and Senate, and U.S. Congressional seats.

We would love for you to join us as a supporting and participating member, with the most generous donation you can possibly make to help us continue our mission to share our Democratic values. Please click the link below to contribute. We welcome and appreciate your support, your participation, advice and fellowship. We look forward to seeing you at the Century Club Banquet and other gatherings soon!

Kathryn Charles
Chair
Wilkes County Democratic Party

Join The Century Club Now

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Pushing Back Against Plastics: Communities are resisting the petrochemical industry’s planned expansion in Appalachia

11/3/2019

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The following article is from the Oct 11th, 2019 "The Appalachian Voice"

Scientists have found a significant amount of microplastics — tiny pieces of plastic smaller than 5 millimeters — in Arctic snow, according to a study published in Science Advances in August. Researchers found that these microplastics were transported there through the atmosphere, which shows how widespread plastic has become in the environment.

Cutting down global plastic use may seem daunting, but individual actions (see sidebar) can help to reduce how much plastic ends up in the environment. At the same time, people concerned about plastics are pursuing more systemic change. For many Northern Appalachian residents and activists, this means resisting the construction of new plastic manufacturing facilities in the region.

Shell is constructing a facility on the Ohio River in Beaver County, Pa., known as the Pennsylvania Petrochemicals Complex. The company expects the facility to produce more than 1.6 million tons of polyethylene plastic each year beginning in the early 2020s.

Polyethylene is one of the most abundant forms of plastic globally, according to a 2018 United Nations report. It is also the same material most shopping bags are made from.

Shell’s plastic-making process will rely on “cracking,” which involves converting ethane, a natural gas liquid, into polyethylene at high temperatures. Oil and gas companies extract natural gas liquids from the Marcellus and Utica shale plays in the Ohio River Valley through hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a process that can cause severe water quality impacts, according to a 2016 report from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Two chemical companies, one based in Thailand and one based in South Korea, are also pursuing plans to construct an ethane cracker along the Ohio River in Belmont County, Ohio. State regulators granted an air pollution permit to the petrochemical plant developers in December 2018, which environmental groups appealed.

On Sept. 23, the groups dropped the appeal after reaching an agreement with developers. The company has agreed to increase transparency and pollution controls in exchange.

According to FracTracker Alliance, a nonprofit organization that analyzes oil and gas industry data, proposed ethane crackers like Shell’s facility will “rely on a regional network of fracking, pipelines, compressor stations, processing stations, and storage to operate.” The U.S. Department of Energy stated in July that ethane from fracking and continued expansion of the Appalachian petrochemical industry could support at least five petrochemical crackers and the associated massive increase in fracked-gas infrastructure.

Opponents of the projects have organized and voiced their concerns to legislators over the potential impacts of pollution that the plastic-producing complex could have both locally and globally. Mark Dixon, a leader in the grassroots resistance effort, co-founded the online platform NoPetroPA to mobilize concerned residents against the Beaver County facility.

“We need to collectively organize to shift consumer demand and government policy to motivate manufacturers and consumers to move away from plastics as one of the primary ways by which we make the stuff that we need every day,” Dixon says.

Learn more about the proposed petrochemical and plastics manufacturing hub in Appalachia and get involved at breatheproject.org/fracking-and-petrochemicals.

Reducing Your Plastic FootprintIn addition to opposing new plastic facilities and related infrastructure, there are different strategies you can use to reduce the impacts of plastic waste.

“If you can be a little conscientious towards the Earth and what we’re doing, then it’s amazing how many little things that you can find throughout the day that you don’t really need,” says Cole Kiziah, recycling coordinator for Watauga County, N.C.

Here are 10 strategies you can put into practice to reduce the amount of plastic consumed in your household:

1. Drink from a reusable water bottle and a reusable coffee mug. One million plastic bottles were purchased every minute across the world in 2017, according to a report from market research firm Euromonitor International.

2. Bring your own reusable bags or containers to the store for groceries, produce and other dry goods. Cotton muslin bags can transport fruit and veggies.

3. Source your food from your local farmers markets or gardens to reduce your dependence on food products packaged in plastic.

4. Purchase essential goods in bulk and avoid plastic packaging when possible. Buying in bulk can also save you money because bulk goods usually cost less per unit.

5. Use bar soap and shampoo or soap powder in reusable containers instead of liquid soap packaged in plastic.

6. Cook dinner instead of picking up takeout. Cooking at home can reduce plastic packaging, save money and result in healthier eating habits.

7. Make your own cleaning products to reduce the amount of plastic containers in your household. Baking soda and vinegar can work as an alternative to cleaning products packaged in plastic.

8. Opt for second-hand purchases. Pre-owned goods tend to have less packaging.

9. Wear clothing made from natural fibers. Synthetic fibers such as polyester tend to shed off clothes and contribute to microplastic pollution. When washing synthetic clothing, use a laundry bag or laundry ball designed to catch microfibers.

10. Contact manufacturers, legislators and local businesses to let them know you support alternatives to single-use plastics.

Switching out disposable drink containers for a reusable mug may not seem like much, but lifestyle changes to reduce plastic use can contribute to the increasing efforts made by people all around the world to reduce the amount of plastic wasted every single day.

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A Message From our New Chair - Kathryn Charles

4/9/2019

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Greetings to my friends and fellow citizens of Wilkes County!

To introduce myself, let me share that I spent my early years here in Wilkes County, attending Wilkesboro and C.C. Wright Elementary Schools, then attending Wilkes Central High School. After graduation, I was off to study Art, Psychology and later Accounting at the Universities of North Carolina at Greensboro and Chapel Hill, graduating with a Bachelor of Science Cum Laude in Accounting from the University of Charleston in Charleston, W.Va.

My 40 year career included Office Management, Public Accounting, Finance and Information Systems (primarily in Surgery) at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center and Beaufort Memorial Hospital in Beaufort, S.C. I am an enthusiastic supporter of education, social justice, a healthy environment, nature, art and animal welfare. I have recently returned to Wilkes County, where I have realized that “retirement” for me must include making a positive contribution to my community and this world we all share.

I would like to express my gratitude to fellow Wilkes Democrats who have placed their confidence in me to chair the Wilkes County Democratic Party for the 2019-2021 term.

Over the next two years, one of my goals is to continue the work of growing our Democratic base in Wilkes, increasing and developing our Democratic precincts, which represent the bedrock of our party. We know we cannot win elections without strong, organized Precincts!

We must increase our outreach efforts to all of our Democrats and unaffiliated citizens who may feel forgotten or unrepresented in our county, including but not limited to, our Hispanic, African American and LGBTQ citizens.

We must bring attention to the need for increased support for our public education system and our teachers, especially in light of the current administration’s attempt to divert funding to private and charter schools.

We must shed light on the serious issues of poverty, food insecurity, and homelessness in our county.

We must continue to seek opportunities for the economic development of our municipalities and county.

We must continue to find, support and elect qualified individuals who will represent us all, including women and minorities, at every level of elected office in this county.

We must preserve and protect our air, land and water, so that future Wilkes citizens will be able to thrive here.

We must do all that we can to protect the voting rights of all individuals and to advocate for fair and non-partisan redistricting.

We must support comprehensive healthcare for all, for seniors, women and persons with disabilities, as well as those who have fallen into the Medicaid Gap and cannot get affordable insurance coverage.

We must demonstrate our support for the rights of all working men and women to be compensated equally for the same work.

It is critical that we hold our elected officials accountable for their actions, and make sure ALL of the people of Wilkes County are represented.

Under the current administration, we have seen an alarming rise in hate and division that tears at the fabric of our society. We must continue to stand in unity against these destructive forces. I will continue to remind myself and others of the pledge we have repeated throughout our lives, “allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

Voting is critical, but “just voting” is no longer enough! Like anything worth having, a strong democracy requires work, rolling up our sleeves, going to meetings, making phone calls, knocking on doors, writing letters, working for good candidates, putting up signs, planning, collaborating, and earning some sweat equity! Participation in whatever way we can is absolutely necessary! I am looking forward to participating with and working with my fellow concerned citizens on these and other important issues that touch our lives!

“Change will not come if we wait for some other person, or if we wait for some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.” - Barack Obama

So now, my friends, let’s Get to Work!

Best regards to all,
Kathryn D. Charles
Chair, Wilkes County Democratic Party

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Higher Ground - Rev WAtts At tHe 2019 County Convention

3/23/2019

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"Let us take the high ground," Rev Richard Watts began as he spoke to the Wilkes Democratic Party at the annual County Convention on March 23rd, 2019. His talk focused on how useless it is to waste time with negativity. It detracts from the things we stand for, like education, a sensible foreign policy, and welcoming and lifting all people up.

"Let's think about who WE are as a country. What makes our country great and our Democracy stronger? WE lift up people. Cooperation is better than conflict. Bridges are better than walls."

He referenced former President Jimmy Carter, who is now our longest living president, as a wonderful example of of compassion and love for community, to which we can all aspire.

Watts, a former teacher and current coordinator for Crosby Scholars in Forsyth County, in addition to pastoring at Rickard's Chapel AME Zion Church in North WIlkesboro, stressed the importance of public education in his speech as the single most important way to help the future of our country. "Good education is key," he claimed. "We have allowed the media and the current administration to tell us that public school and public education is bad," he elaborated, adding that an education with the same opportunity for every child is vital to a healthy community.

"When people are just trying to put food on the table, keep a roof over their heads, and clothes on their backs, they don't have time to read to their kids," Watts said, stressing the importance of economic stability along with programs like Head Start to helping him and so many others to get the positive start on their education. Referencing that neither of his parents held a high school diploma, he urged us to protect public education.

"We want EVERY child to have a free, quality education."

Realizing that each student is different, Watts said "some of the quietest students have the best solutions." He referenced his early recollections of his 1st grade teacher Mrs. Pollack, a kind and powerful woman in his life. "We ALL must work together to make ALL students ready for college."

He lamented that in 1982-84 when he was at Wake Forest, he and his fellow black students were protesting and fighting to stop "Old South" dress up parties and displaying the Confederate flag on campus. The same protests are occurring across college campuses today. The same battles have to be fought again and again. "We can not stop. They energize their base, and we must energize OUR base."

"This country is in a terrible spot," Rev Watts concluded. "But we can take it back again,...to reach greatness."

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PRECINCT ORGANIZATION

1/6/2019

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2019 is not a big election year,...except for here! This year we will elect new county party officers and precinct leadership. The precincts start first.

The local voting precinct is the smallest subset of politics in the party, but definitely the most powerful. This is basically neighbors working with neighbors in their immediate community to organize and make change. 2019 is an election year for our local precincts, so each precinct will need to be organized and officers and delegates elected.

Come to the monthly meeting to learn more about precinct organization and how to get involved. Wilkes has difficulty organizing all our precincts, so we need all current 28 precinct leaders or interested persons to come to the meeting if they need more information. Each current precinct chair should have already received a pdf with the organization requirements and their precinct's sustaining fund goal (based on the numbers of votes cast in their precinct for the last governor's election.)

This packet included:

1) How many convention votes each precinct will get at the county convention to vote for Wilkes Democratic Party Officers at the Wilkes County Convention in March.

2) How many delegates you'll elect from each precinct (some precincts require as many as 7 to be fully organized.)

3) Your precinct's sustaining fund goal to the state NC Democratic party (goes to access for software use and other support) We will do a county-wide precinct organization meeting for maximum efficiency on Saturday, February 16th at 10amat the Wilkes County Agricultural building. It's a great time to get together with all of Wilkes County's precincts represented.

If you are a precinct chair and did NOT receive this packet, please contact us immediately or pick yours up at the January monthly meeting.

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CoOPER on UNC-Tv's "FIRST IN FUTURE"

7/9/2018

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3rd Vice Chair of the Wilkes Democratic Party, Michael Cooper, went on UNC-TV's "First In Future" to speak on small town politics and how to keep young people engaged in the towns in which they grew up.

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What's Next For Healthcare

8/1/2017

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The healthcare votes in the Senate were dramatic. They were stressful to watch, and as the hours passed midnight, many of us were too anxious to sleep. For others, waking up to the news that next day was a glimmer of hope for the functionality of our democracy that yes, we CAN take our eyes off the process for a moment and trust that democracy can work - if just barely. Millions of heroes should be thanked for their hard work writing letters, calling, protesting, even getting arrested to protest the injustice of removing people from their healthcare or pricing them out of their access to care.

However, we know the GOP will try again. They tried more than 50 times during the Obama Administration to do so,...why should they stop trying to do so with a Republican majority? The Affordable Care Act saved lives and improved access to healthcare for millions of Americans. Social programs created by the government can do that in large-scale ways that can improve lives.

But President Trump has tweeted to stop the cost-sharing subsidies that the government has promised to offset the low-income enrollees to the program. Let's be very clear; these subsidies are not a "bailout." They are the agreement that was made by the government to the American people. Just because our current President doesn't like the name attached to it, does not mean he can just not pay.

Now, I know,...I know,...he has done this all the time in his private life. In the 80s and 90s, a local Wilkes County manufacturer I know sold to him and he would routinely not pay his last invoice. They had to fight and beg and in the end, would settle for 10% less because it was better than nothing. But he doesn't understand that the US government is not allowed to do this. Insurance companies can actually sue the US government in the US Court of Federal Claims, and they'd be right to do so.

And yet even this week, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners are trying to figure out what to do since insurers must submit their final 2018 rates to officials by August 16th. The ACA after all is still the law. According to Blue Cross Blue Shield of NC earlier this summer, they are considering raising premiums an average of 22.9% if the government decides to renege on their agreement. With the agreed upon subsidies, the company said their premiums average increase would have been only 8.8%.

So, next we need to fight back against the government if they try to "starve" the ACA out of existence and we need the insurance companies to fight with us, because we the people should not be the ones to suffer for Trumpcare's failure. And we should also flood protests on Berger and Moore in the North Carolina General Assembly with their failure to expand Medicaid and close the gap, which has stopped so many in North Carolina from being able to afford healthcare because they continue to deny coverage expansion.

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Redeeming Ourselves

7/9/2017

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This article was written by Wilkes Democrats 3rd Vice Chair Michael Cooper, Jr. and was originally printed online at 'National Affairs'. The full article is found HERE.

If there are winners and losers in 21st-century America, I come from the losing side. Hit hard by the Great Recession and by deindustrialization, my hometown of North Wilkesboro, North Carolina, has suffered one of the worst declines in the country since the new millennium.

In 2000, when I enrolled as a freshman at Wilkes Central High School, the median income in the county was $47,992 a year. In 2014, when I came home to Wilkes to practice law, the median income was $33,398. In a county with a population of 69,000, there were 4,451 fewer jobs in manufacturing, 46 fewer retail stores, and a net loss of over $60 million in payroll. The face of the losing side of globalization, Wilkes was featured during the 2016 election on PBS NewsHour, Morning Joe, and the cover of the New York Times as a home to Americans "living among the ruins of a lapsed golden age."

But behind all the statistics and concerned news reports were real people, whose savings and way of life had been wiped out. Working-class Americans have been left behind by the brain drain, the Big Sort, the Age of Acceleration, and the Metropolitan Revolution. Worse, disconnected from each other, atomized by the internet, and ignored by the political establishment, they are now dying younger from alcoholism and addiction. The system has failed them.

So white working-class Americans in the Rust Belt and rural America sought revenge against incumbent politicians, the media, government bureaucrats, dynasties, and the ascendant coalition of minorities, single women, and college-educated millennials stealing their place in society. Their economic anxiety and cultural despair caused racial resentment and the return of illiberalism, and Donald Trump was their revenge. He won the presidency by encouraging their anger and channeling their grief into tribalism, scapegoating immigrants and refugees as the cause of complex problems beyond their control: the drug epidemic, lack of mobility, and a culture in decay.

But protectionism, xenophobia, and isolationism will not save the working class from robots and smart phones and self-driving cars. Economies built on manufacturing were destined to suffer when America transitioned to the service sector and high tech, and there were always going to be growing pains. But policymakers and elected officials underestimated the costs, and so did the Americans who experienced them.

It is well past time to address this failure, and it's going to take more than electing someone who channels people's frustrations. Progress will require new thinking and an all-hands-on-deck approach. Working-class Americans need honesty and realistic, concrete plans for the future.

I have had more luck than most, and, while I love my hometown, I don't pretend to know and understand everything that motivates my neighbors. But I do know that, in Wilkes County, in the hollows of West Virginia, in the steel towns, the bonds of community came apart, and we were powerless against the forces of globalization. The time has come to reconnect those bonds, to restore economic and political power to those who feel helpless, and to find paths forward for those who deserve new victories. We can make all of America great again if we start from the bottom up.

DECLINE AND FALL
In the 1980s and '90s, when I was growing up, Wilkes County was the very image of rural America, full of family farms on rolling countryside. Surrounded by the Blue Ridge Mountains, my home of North Wilkesboro began as a railroad town in the 1890s, and by mid-century was full of factories that built a thriving middle class. It was home to the nation's largest mirror factory, and the American Furniture Company employed thousands. North Wilkesboro Hardware, founded by L. S. Lowe in 1921, ultimately became a Fortune 500 company. Apart from Lowe's, the town's claim to fame is being one of the birthplaces of NASCAR.

My family lived in a quiet suburban neighborhood. My mom taught at an elementary school, and my dad worked in the corporate headquarters of Lowe's. He read The Art of the Deal, sold Amway on the side, and dreamed of being rich. My parents were a success story. The first in their families to go to college, they were descended from farmers who settled in the mountains of North Carolina two centuries earlier. They were able to use their savings to open a small used bookstore on Main Street in North Wilkesboro, where flower stores and sandwich shops lined the streets. I grew up in the store reading Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., and P. J. O'Rourke, and books about the Civil War, daydreaming of life outside of a town that seemed overly peaceful. I graduated high school in the spring of 2004, when the Iraq War was in its infancy. If there were signs of wage stagnation and declining mobility, we didn't notice, as we turned our attention to distant threats of terror.

The collapse happened so slowly that no one noticed the crisis coming. [MORE]

Read the full article at the National Affairs site:
https://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/redeeming-ourselves

National Affairs is a quarterly journal of essays about domestic policy, political economy, society, culture, and political thought. It aims to help Americans think a little more clearly about our public life, and rise a little more ably to the challenge of self-government.

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The Need For A HeadQuarters

7/6/2017

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Wilkes County Needs A Democratic HQ

Wilkes County Democrats haven't had a permanent headquarters as long as I remember. As a kid, it just seemed like Forester's Nu-Way was the HQ because of the critical mass of signs my grandfather would put up. During the bulk of my lifetime the Democratic Party has been, well, transient. We pool our funds long enough to get us through an election, but then after a few months, we'll let the building go in order to conserve funds. It's not always easy being a Democrat in a red county.

But we feel like the time has come for the big ask. We need a reliable meeting space, an organizing hub, a place to store our supplies. With organizing at the local level more important than ever before, we need citizens of Wilkes County to know there is a place they can go for information and activism. We need a permanent HQ to be that place.

We are ideally looking for something local in the $500 - $700 a month range, and we need recurring monthly contributors to help us budget and plan for the long-term. Municipal elections are just around the corner, and 2018 will be a huge midterm election year for us. Turn out is historically low for midterms, but with a visible and reliable presence, Democrats can make some changes in Congress.

We are hoping you can help us procure a headquarters that we can all be proud of and that is a resource for the entire community. Even a donation of $5 per month is something we can count on to help. Visit our Act Blue Page to help with this important initiative. Thanks!

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Be Ready

12/1/2016

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"Never be surprised by what they do. Be ready."

It's a phrase I heard often from my Dad while growing up. It's pessimistic and dark, sure,…but that's what being a 4th generation Democrat in Wilkes County breeds within you.

Times when you have the thought, "Nah, even the GOP wouldn't do something so crazy, reckless, or self-serving," and you are tempted to give them the benefit of the doubt, is when it most applies. We should be applying it to everything happening right now, because we're about to see a power grab that is unprecedented in our lifetimes.

It is also why organizing is so important right now. Democrats must identify as such in Wilkes. There are many more of us than most people realize, and we tend to isolate ourselves with little formal contact under that heading. But Wilkes County has only 1/2 of its Democrat precincts organized in this county. All it takes is 4 registered Dems to do it, and it can mean gaining a voice during these difficult days ahead. We won't be shouting into the void.

Watauga County turned blue this election. If they can do it, we can too,...but it'll take every Democrat's participation with the party. We simply don't have enough dedicated Dems in this county that are willing to do the work right now. We go back to the same handful of volunteers to do so much, that they're getting burned out and tired. The same few people did all the calling, canvassing, e-mailing and sign planting in this last election. We need fresh bodies with energy and passion.

We have outlets for our voice that we've never had before. We have this blog, we have Facebook, we have Twitter,...we have platforms from which to shout and share. But we need you. We need you to go to Board of Education meetings and speak out when our students aren't put first, we need you to go to town meetings, and planning board meetings and County Commissioner meetings to keep track of the dealings happening under our noses. We need people to help Dems fundraise so we can have an HQ year round and visibility for those that move here.

We are not apathetic. I know this. It's just such a daunting task for each us us that we don't know where to start. So just start with something. One thing. Come to the next Wilkes Democrats meeting December 13th at 6pm at Benton Hall in North Wilkesboro. Get organized FIRST. Then, write a piece for this very blog. Like and Share us on Facebook. Volunteer to call our legislators,...again and again. Help be a watchdog at local meetings for abuses of power. And most importantly, don't be afraid to be a Democrat in Wilkes County. Be ready.

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