DECEMBER 15, 2023
CONTENTS
UP FRONT
Vote for Steering Committee and priority campaigns — ballot closes TOMORROW
2023 Local Convention wrap-up
- Montgomery County Council passes rent stabilization funding
Vote for Steering Committee and priority campaigns — ballot closes TOMORROW
Ballots to vote for members of the Steering Committee and priority campaigns for the upcoming year have been sent to all Metro DC DSA members in good standing via OpaVote. Please do not click the link to open your ballot until you are prepared to cast your vote. The deadline to submit your ballot is Saturday, December 16 at 11:59pm.
If you have not received your ballot, please:
- Check your eligibility (To be eligible to receive a ballot, you must have been a member in good standing at least 30 days prior to the convention.)
- Check your spam folder
- Check any alternate email addresses which may have been associated with your DSA membership
- Email internal-elections@mdcdsa.org to ask about the status of your ballot.
If you have any questions or concerns about the voting process, please reach out to @Ali (They/Them) on Slack or email internal-elections@mdcdsa.org.
2023 Local Convention wrap-up
Metro DC DSA’s Local Convention was held successfully this past weekend, allowing comrades to discuss the nature, structure and goals of the chapter at large. Along with motivating for priority resolutions, the 2024 budget and three bylaw amendments were discussed and voted on:
- A 2024 Budget was approved by the Convention. Out of 80 voters, 78 voted yes, 0 voted no, 2 abstained.
- Bylaws Amendment 1: Dissolve the Member Engagement Committee and establish the Member Engagement Department under the Administrative Committee was adopted by vote of the Convention. Out of 124 voters, 116 voted yes, 3 voted no, and 5 abstained.
- BA2: Amending Bylaws for Proportional Allocation of Steering Committee Seat was rejected by the Convention. Out of 132 voters, 42 voted yes, 86 voted no, and 4 abstained.
- BA3: YDSA Steering Delegate was adopted by the Convention. Out of 108 voters, 104 voted yes, 2 voted no, and 2 abstained.
Four electoral endorsements are still being considered by Metro DC DSA. Members can check their convention bulletin for the endorsement questionnaires. DSA members in good standing will be able to vote for endorsements in late January, following a candidate Q&A to be organized in next month.
A huge socialist thank you to our comrades on the tech team, our comrade parliamentarian, our comrade treasurer for wrangling OpenSlides, the comrades who submitted items for consideration, the comrades who spoke, every comrade who helped make convention happen and all comrades who attended virtually or in person. Our chapter’s democracy exists because you chose to take part.
Montgomery County Council passes rent stabilization funding
This week, the Montgomery County Council approved $1.347 million to fund a new office tasked with enforcing the county’s new rent stabilization law. Montgomery County’s new rent stabilization law passed earlier this summer thanks to tireless pressure from tenants and organizers, including the Montgomery County branch of Metro DC DSA. This appropriation includes funding to hire nine new employees, who will be essential for enforcing the rent stabilization mandate in effect across the County. The new rent stabilization law impacts most rental units in Montgomery County (including single family houses, town houses, and condos if the landlord owns three or more units or is an LLC). Yearly rent increases are pegged to the CPI-U+3%, but no greater than 6%.
If you are a Montgomery County tenant experiencing a rent increase of more than 6%, email mocotenants@gmail.com. MoCo DSA is keeping tenants organized to make sure the law is kept in effect. You can learn more about the specifics of the law from the Montgomery County Department of Housing and Community Affairs website.
BRIEFS
ICE Out of Arlington coalition to pack Arlington County Board meeting — Saturday, December 16 at 8am
ICE Out of Arlington is again asking comrades to pack the Arlington County Board meeting this Saturday, December 16 at 8am. The objective is to maintain pressure on the Arlington County board to push for revocation of section 7 of the Trust policy, which allows the Arlington County PD to collaborate with ICE at their own discretion. Affected community members will be speaking before the board and have asked us to show up in solidarity. If you think you might be able to make it, please RSVP here.
Comrades at La ColectiVA, an immigrant rights organization operating in NOVA, are looking for volunteers to canvass in Arlington County and gather signatures for their petitions to get ICE Out of Arlington and Make Barcroft Affordable throughout the month of January. Sign up here.
One year in, restaurant workers see growth in wage earnings due to Initiative 82
A recent report from DCist analyzed worker sentiment and wages in the restaurant industry one year out from passage of Initiative 82. When benchmarked to the consumer price index, worker earnings have far outpaced the rate of inflation — suggesting the benefits of the higher base minimum wage being paid to tipped workers post-I82. Most workers interviewed spoke favorably of the increased stability and higher wages gained from the base-wage increase.
The current base minimum wage for tipped workers — the bare minimum that must be paid to employees by employers — is $8/hr. However, if an employee’s tip earnings, averaged weekly, added to this base wage do not equal DC’s full minimum wage ($17/hr), the employer must pay the difference. The tipped minimum wage in DC is set to increase next July, 2024, to $10/hr, to be completely phased out by 2027.
Metro DC DSA played a critical role in passing Initiative 82: from conducting a mass signature-collecting blitz to get I82 on the ballot, to extensive field work, research, communications and beyond leading up to Election Day. (Read The Socialist’s coverage of Initiative 82 published last October.)
Fall Reading Group on Le Guin continues impromptu
“The King is pregnant!” Read one of the most beloved feminist and queer sci-fi novels with comrades over the winter: The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula Le Guin. All are welcome to this impromptu follow-up to our MDC DSA fall reading group on Le Guin’s The Dispossessed. On Wednesday, December 20, an introductory meeting to get to know each other will set the stage for the reading group, which includes some short fiction and non-fiction, with an eye towards understanding gender abolition, gender roles, transness and other queer topics and their political implications. You can read the syllabus here, and sign up here.
INFO ACCESS
MDC DSA Publications Schedule: The final December MDC DSA Update for 2023 is scheduled for December 29, skipping Friday the 22nd. Friday, January 5 will nominally be the Update plus the first Washington Socialist of 2024. Write your scenario of the terms of struggle and victory for DSA in 2024 now; submit to washingtonsocialist@mdcdsa.org.
Would you like to participate in MDC DSA’s publications? We write, we edit, we design, we do the tech — there are so many ways your hand could lighten the load in 2024 and beyond. Check us out on #publications and let us know what you would like to write, or write about, or …? If you would like to see something included in the Update, submit your suggestions to the tip line.
Quick reference links for MDC DSA:
- On MDC DSA’s public website, the DSA-curious can find:
- Our local structure — campaigns, working groups, etc.
- Capsule introduction to the chapter including our branches covering the DMV
- A home-grown history of our local chapter
- Archive of the Washington Socialist
- Archive of our MDC DSA Socialist Night School (recordings and some transcriptions)
- National DSA’s website
- DSA Feed, an RSS feed that aggregates multiple DSA publications — including our own Washington Socialist — in one convenient place. More from the National Tech Committee here.
And, live from our studio: Wednesday, December 20 from 8 to 9pm | Why You Should Join DSA / New Member Orientation including Q&A!
DSA CALENDAR OF EVENTS
Monday, December 18
6:30 – 8pm | Labor Working Group Meeting
Wednesday, December 20
8 – 9pm | Why You Should Join DSA / New Member Orientation
6:30pm | Reading Group on Le Guin’s Left Hand of Darkness initial meeting
Thursday, December 21
6:30 – 8:30pm | NoVA DSA Social Meetup
– 2024 –
Tuesday, January 2
COMMUNITY BULLETIN
Volunteer Community Leaf Collection Day | Sistained8
Fallen leaves can become a nuisance in urban city centers, but they are an excellent carbon source (browns) for all the gardeners and composters out there. Join Sistained8 for their third annual Volunteer Community Leaf Collection Day this Saturday, December 16 at 1:30pm. The meet up location is 241 42 Street NE and the volunteer sign-up link is here. This is a family-friendly, free event.
Community Table | Ward 6 Mutual Aid/Serve Your City
Free cleaning supplies, clothes, food, household items,and much more at Ward 6 Mutual Aid’s regular Community Table event on Saturday, December 16. The Community Table will be held at Miner Elementary School (601 15 Street NE) and start at 11am. No registration required.
Holiday Fundraiser | Ward 2 Mutual Aid
Help Ward 2 Mutual Aid better support their community by making a donation to their work. W2 Mutual Aid will use donations to provide winter and all-season clothing, food, toiletries and other essentials to community members in need.
Alternative Ways to Answer the Call for a General Strike | Seeding Sovereignty
If you are not able to be part of a collective or public action, there are still many other ways to commit to liberation for Palestine and for all peoples. Helpful guide full of diverse actions for showing solidarity by Seeding Sovereignty.
GOOD READS / ESSENTIAL TRAFFIC
Labor Leader AI-Jen Poo Confronts ’The Biggest Driver of Economic Inequality That Nobody Talks About. | Portside Ai-jen Poo, a labor organizer and president of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, has been shining the spotlight on the crisis of care in the United States for almost three decades. She advocates for some of the nation’s lowest paid workers — those who tend to our children, the elderly and the disabled.
What can US spy agencies do now to snoop on everyday people and what legislative moves might make a difference? “The FISA Court revealed that the FBI engaged in “persistent and widespread” violations when conducting these backdoor [warrantless] searches.
Washington City Paper reports: “Bowser Opts to Ignore the Law, Raiding Money for Increased SNAP Benefits Mandated by the Council.” Loose Lips writes: “Bowser is simultaneously disregarding the laws she claims to hold so dear while denying more than 141,000 of the city’s most-in-need residents some extra money to put food on the table.”
From Jacobin: “Elon Musk is attempting to expand Tesla into Sweden and circumvent its unions — but Swedish labor has a long history of taking on big US firms. If they can bring Tesla to heel, it will mark a major victory for organized labor across the globe.”
Inside the Troll Army Waging Trump’s Online Campaign – A detailed and unpleasant look at fringe actors who may or may not be deliberately skirting campaign law, from the New York Times.
The flame of thought, the magnificence of art, the wonder of discovery, and the audacity of invention all belong to revolutionary periods when humanity, tired of the chains of its restrictions, shatters them, and stops inebriated to breathe the breeze of a vaster and freer horizon.
–Virgilia D’Andrea