Claremont Insider: Douglas Johnson
Showing posts with label Douglas Johnson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Douglas Johnson. Show all posts

Sunday, September 12, 2010

Helped Wanted, Part Two - UPDATED

As we indicated on Friday, the Claremont Unified School District's school bond campaign committee is looking to hire some able-bodied college students for its to work with its paid campaign consultant and its paid campaign manager in their "grassroots" Yes on CL effort.

We received a few emails from readers who were more than a little irritated by Yes on CL committee member Mike Seder's attempt at reaching out to his alma mater, Claremont McKenna College and CMC's Rose Institute, and we published a "Help Wanted" email from Rose fellow Douglas Johnson.

Johnson's email included this job description for the Yes on CL campaign manager position :

Campaign manager/field organizer – Claremont, CA, school bond measure.

Some political campaign experience or experience working with campaign volunteers preferred.

Irregular hours: >40 hrs/week through early November. Some evenings and weekends included.

Must have your own car. Laptop ideal but not necessary.

Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

• Coordinating communication between members of the campaign team, including campaign consultant, superintendent & district officials, steering committee, volunteers, fundraising team and other community leaders and activists.

[CUSD's superintendent and district officials are barred from working directly on the campaign. Yet, according to the campaign's own job description, the district seems to be directly in charge of the campaign. Someone needs to file a complaint with the state's Fair Political Practices Commission. -ed]

• Under direction of the campaign consultant, implementation of a field campaign operation staffed by volunteers. Field operations may include volunteer recruitment, scheduling and training, voter registration, phone banks and precinct walks, vote-by-mail drives, lawn sign distribution, staging free media events and getting out the vote (GOTV) activities.

• Working with members of the fundraising team to mail invitations,
request contributions, collect checks, write thank-you notes and hold events (if necessary).

• Coordinating with treasurer to ensure accurate and timely filing of campaign reports and other necessary forms.

• General day-to-day coordination and management of the campaign office, phone banks and other ongoing activities.

• Closing down campaign following election day, including the coordination of final fundraising reports, ensuring that campaign committee members and others are thanked appropriately and making arrangements to settle all outstanding campaign financial commitments.

Contact: Mike Seder, seder@fairplex.com


UPDATED Sunday, September 12, 5:45pm:

The CMC connection for Mike Seder goes beyond his alumnus status. Seder's wife Diana is director of CMC's Career Services Center. As her CMC bio states, she "knows CMC and CMC students from start to finish."

Diana Seder
Director
Oversees all Career Services programs and events
dseder@cmc.edu

Diana’s long-standing relationship with higher education administration started in 1987 when she graduated with her MBA from Claremont Graduate School and was hired by the same program to be their Associate Director. In 1991, she became the Acting Director of the Claremont Graduate School Office of Career Services, and then came to work at the CMC Career Services Center in 1997. Interestingly, at different times she has held both the Associate Director (Recruiting) and the Associate Director (Internship) positions as year-long assignments, so she is very familiar with the operations of the CSC. Diana assumes her role as Interim Director after an 8-year tenure with the Office of Admissions at CMC. “I know CMC and CMC students from start to finish” she says.

Friday, September 10, 2010

CUSD to CMC: Help wanted

The Claremont Unified School District's Measure CL campaign team seeks students to work with a paid campaign manager to work on the Yes on CL effort.

Campaign committee person and Claremont 400 aspirant Mike Seder, whom we've seen on several occasions, is a graduate of Claremont McKenna College and, in his search for able-bodied campaign workers, seems to have been in contact with at least one person at CMC's Rose Institute.

This came in over the wire from a couple sources:

DATE: Wed, September 8, 2010 10:53:27 PM
TO:
Claremont Insider [claremontbuzz@yahoo.com]
SUBJECT: FW: Claremont campaign openings


From: Douglas Johnson [douglas.johnson@cmc.edu]
Organization: Rose Institute of State & Local Government at CMC
Reply-To: [douglas.johnson@cmc.edu]
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2010 13:54:57 -0700
To: XXX
Cc: Mike Seder [seder@fairplex.com]
Subject: Claremont campaign openings

A friend from the Fairplex is deeply involved in the current campaign in support of a parcel tax to support Claremont schools. The campaign has a firm doing strategic consulting, along with a board of prominent local supporters, but they are looking for student volunteers and a paid day to day campaign manager.

Do you know of students (or student organizations) who might be interested in spending some time helping with this campaign to help Claremont schools, or who want to get some experience in a campaign at the grassroots level? This is a great way to do this without having to travel far from campus. If you know of anyone interested, could you encourage them to contact Mike Seder (seder@fairplex.com)? Mike's both a great guy and CMC Class of 1982. If they have questions, I'm also happy to talk to them and share what limited info I have regarding the campaign.

Obviously, time is tight as campaign day's approaching rapidly. Thanks!

- Doug

Douglas Johnson
Fellow
Rose Institute of State and Local Government
Claremont McKenna College
o 909-621-8159
m 310-200-2058
douglas.johnson@cmc.edu
www.RoseReport.org

Johnson's email seems to support the notion that the campaign is driven by "a firm doing strategic consulting," no doubt TBWB Strategies and consultant Jared Boigon, who has advised the CUSD Board of Education from the very beginning.

It also struck us as very strange that a conservative organization like the Rose Institute would lend itself to campaigning for a highly dubious $95 million school bond (not a parcel tax, Doug). You'd think that with Claremont property owners still paying off $30 million of the last, misspent school bond, the Rose Institute would be ideologically inclined to question the wisdom of tacking on another $95 million in bonded indebtedness, especially when that new money amounts to little more than a blank check for a district that has repeatedly failed to demonstrate any fiscal commonsense.

But then, these are strange times.

* * * * *

Coming Soon: You may wonder what the job description looks like for the above position. Check back this weekend.

* * * * *

Our spies tell us that the Yes on CL campaign is casting quite a wide net in its outreach efforts. For instance, a couple weekends ago, a group of Claremont High School students who are against the bond were at the Claremont Sunday Farmers' Market handing out arguments against the bond. We hear that the kids had a volunteer sign-up list.

Who signed up to help on the "NO" campaign? None other than than the ever-subtle, pro-CL Ken Corhan (photo, left), who was summoned to the scene by CUSD board member Jeff Stark. Shilling for failed Claremont City Council candidates isn't enough for the ol' Kenster. This just goes to show that the Claremont 400 can be relied upon to run the same plays, over and over.

Leave it to Corhan to think he's so clever he'd be able to plant himself as a mole in a No on CL organizing party. Why can't he just be like the Insider and let the clandestine information come in over the transom unasked for? A word to the wise: When it comes to the Claremonsters, trust no one.