A Proposed Strategic Plan for
the HCRP for 2009-2010

Creating New Opportunities by Applying
Ageless Principles to Local Challenges:

A Strategy for Republicans to Win Future Elections in Harris County
The Plan Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

Action Plan to Meet Objectives: (Continued)

6. To better mobilize the Party by using every available technology (old and new) to win elections within the county, and to coordinate with other county, state, and national party organizations to identify prospective voters, to get them registered, and to get them to the polls during the election.

We already have talked about technology, but let's put it all in context: we need an infrastructure in place by the summer of 2010 to fight a 13-day election war beginning on the first day of early voting in October.

Here is the "hardware" we need: a secure, interactive website, linked to social networking sites, for communication among party officials and with Republican voters; a stand-alone system for the HCRP to track Republican voters, similar to Voter Vault, that is accessible to every precinct chair 24 hours a day, and that can be updated from polling places on a real-time basis during the election; Blackberries or PDAs to be issued to all poll workers to communicate real-time voting information to the party, and eventually the issuance of such equipment to all precinct chairs and party officials; sufficient permanent satellite offices around the county; constant volunteer availability at the headquarters and satellite offices starting 60 days before election day to maintain office operations and man phone banks and other activities; interactive and accessible communication with the Republican Parties at the state and national level, and in adjacent counties, to coordinate manpower needs; and access to gathering places and transportation sources to actually move voters to the polls throughout the 13-day voting period.

In addition to this "hardware", we need to have volunteer deputies work with our Vice Chair for Outreach, who are authorized to register voters at outreach events, and to register voters as we track new developments, new occupancy permits, new school registrations and new business openings. As the registrations are taken, the volunteers need to be able to input the data into the HCRP database. We will also need volunteers to update the information the HCRP does have and convert it to the new system. The Vice Chair for Communication must work with the precinct chairs to use the data available to communicate with Republican voters at least weekly starting 90 days before the election; twice a week starting 60 days before the election; and daily starting 20 days before election day -including updates on the voters' voting status and where the nearest convenient early-voting location is on any given day. Finally, our army of precinct chairs and street captains need to be ready every evening or morning of the 13-day war to contact voters and to arrange getting them to the polls.

Earlier we mentioned ideas for mobilizing a local counterpart to ACORN-like organizations, for creating a virtual "war-room" to rebut anti-Republican media, and for developing short educational spots to broadcast on local media. These activities should crystallize by the end of the summer of 2010, with the broadcast spots becoming more focused on election-related issues by the end of that summer.

Starting with the November 2009 city council races and continuing into the November 2010 elections, we should use the 12 days of early voting and the actual Election Day as a combined bloc of 13 election days and we will work on getting our voters to the polls for all 13 days. The question will no longer be "will you be voting?" Instead, the question will be, "what day will you be voting, and how can we help you get to the polls?" All the technology in the world will be of no use unless we have a plan in place.

7. To raise the money needed to effectively implement the plan and operate the Party machinery.

What was just outlined will cost money -money the HCRP does not now have.

During calendar year 2008, $2.366 million was gathered into the HCRP account. Unfortunately, over $1.9 million of that amount reflected funds paid into the HCRP to facilitate a specific purpose: either money from judicial candidates to fund a joint campaign they designed and implemented; or money transferred between the state and local party. The HCRP only actually raised $243,297 from independent donors (306 individuals, 13 entities, and 4 Republican clubs), and had to raise about another $200,000 from candidates, elected officials, and party officials just to cover operating expenses and keep a positive balance in the bank.

For the third largest county with the fourth largest city in the country -and the most Republican metropolitan county in the country -this fundraising result in a contested election year is dumbfounding. In order to stay competitive, open and maintain satellite offices, and acquire the resources to fight the 13-day war in 2010, the HCRP needs to raise about $2 million to cover the costs of rent, equipment, software, media, and manpower, as well as to start an endowment that can be used in the future to cover operating expenses. To raise this type of money, the HCRP will have to mount a substantial fundraising campaign in multiple ways.

The Treasurer will need to work with a new Vice Chair for Fundraising, who, in turn, will need to establish a fundraising team. The Treasurer must establish a budget to cover the projected operating expenses of the Party through December, 2010, including the costs associated with implementing the 10 objectives of this plan. Once the budget is prepared, the Vice Chair for Fundraising must establish a plan for fundraising to cover the budget, which will be implemented by the fundraising team.

The fundraising plan should include use of all available resources to formulate a campaign: TFRW and other affiliated clubs; old and new donors, and donor networks; the business community and related professional organizations and PACs; an annual spring fundraising drive; small donor activities, including the "Roots" program currently under way through the Finance Committee of the Executive Committee; and the Internet.

8. To better coordinate with other county chairs in the region to elect our shared candidates.

There are numerous state and federal legislative and judicial offices whose districts cross Harris and at least one other county. In addition, several cities and school districts cross county lines. Harris County is truly the hub of a large, multi-county metropolitan area. We need to coordinate our election activities based on that reality.

Based on anecdotal evidence, this coordination was not done in 2008. During that last campaign, we heard stories from other county parties in the metropolitan area that their volunteers could not reach anyone with the HCRP to coordinate campaign activities or logistics -no one even answered the phone or responded to emails. We can and should do better.

In fact, the Texas Election Code contemplates this type of coordination under Section 171.054. Besides Senate District committees and chairs, the TEC contemplates committees and chairs for each district that crosses county lines. Besides the legality of such coordination, the reality of metropolitan campaigns requires such logistical coordination.

The County Chair should work with the State Chair and other county chairs to establish statutory committees for each cross-county district. Moreover, party headquarters should maintain direct communication with the county chairs of each county that shares a district with Harris County to facilitate campaign and logistical coordination. Each committee should identify areas where coordination can help get-the-vote-out for Republican candidates in the shared district, and should create and implement a plan for such coordination.

This proposal is not intended to create formal bureaucracies. The intent behind the proposal is to create a flexible mechanism whereby the county parties share information and resources, help coordinate with candidate recruitment and campaign support, and help with get-out-the-vote efforts for these shared districts. We need to do whatever we legally can do to break-down formalities or customs that, in the past, inhibit this type and level of coordination.

9. To work with other county chairs in other major urban counties around the country to develop an "urban plan" to use our principles to address urban issues, for candidate recruitment, and for voter outreach.

The Republican Party has for too long neglected urban issues, and therefore is losing urban voters and elections. With the growth and increased population density of Harris County, we can not continue to ignore these issues and races and still win elections.

In fact, Republicans are not just losing the urban voter, we are losing all of the metropolitan voters (urban and suburban voters) -in Texas and across the country. We cannot win elections in Harris County by just relying on policies that address the concerns of rural or ex-urban voters.

A recent PowerPoint presentation from the state party shows that Republicans are losing ground where most Texans now live. Of the 254 counties in Texas, Republicans gained votes in 140 counties with 2,438,604 registered voters, while Democrats gained votes in 114 counties with 11,136,458 registered voters. The 50 fastest growing Republican counties in Texas have a total of 637,694 registered voters, while the 50 fastest growing Democratic counties have a total of 8,959,881 registered voters. Indeed, we lost the straight-ticket vote in Harris County to the Democrats in both 2006 and 2008.

This trend also is consistent with the following graph produced by Nate Silver and recently published in Esquire magazine showing how people voted in rural, suburban, and urban areas:


You do the math -if this trend continues, we will not elect Republicans in Harris County and will soon lose our statewide offices.

We need to face reality: too many metropolitan voters do not understand how our principles of individual empowerment, which promote a smaller role for the federal government, and a limited, yet effective, role for local government, make their lives better. Moreover, in the current economic and political environment, and with our credibility and trust damaged, it will be harder for us to get these voters to even listen to us, let alone be willing to learn and understand our message.

If we expect to have any hope of getting these voters' attention, we need to start talking about the issues they care about: keeping children in school through high-school graduation; providing children with the knowledge they will need to succeed in college and in the economy; making college affordable; making neighborhoods safe for children and families; keeping men in families and neighborhoods; addressing the cost and availability of health care; making sure housing remains affordable; maintaining a modern infrastructure; maximizing workers' take-home pay; making sure retirement savings are safe; and making sure good-paying jobs are available.

These are not Democratic issues, it just sounds like they are because we rarely talk about them, except to focus on processes and costs. We need to develop actual policies that address these issues by implementing our principles. We also need to recruit, train and support candidates who will press our agenda on city councils and school boards, as well as legislatures and county boards.

What we are saying is not a pipe-dream. It's been done by Republican mayors in New York and Los Angeles in the last two decades. It's being done in young, growing cities, like Boise and Reno. Houston, with its established neighborhoods and business community, and with its growth, has elements of both the old and young cities, and has something they don't -a natural conservative political base.

If we can't develop an urban/metropolitan policy here, Republicans have little chance of succeeding anywhere else. If Republicans do not develop an urban/metropolitan policy, the Obama agenda and recent voting trends may combine to marginalize the conservative principles of our party in this county, this state, and nationally, for many years to come.

The County Chair should establish contact with GOP chairs of other urban counties, and consult with recognized officeholders and experts, to help develop and implement a plan for identifying and addressing urban issues, and for contesting urban races.

10. To work to reform judicial elections in Texas (or at least in urban counties) in order to retain the ability to elect restrained judges while avoiding sweeps.

We need to fix the way we elect judges in our urban countiesAiit no longer helps the party to elect judges the way we do, and it harms the system of justice to endure sweeps that bring in unqualified or unprepared jurists. Contrary to what some are advocating, we do not have to implement a completely non-partisan system to affect significant change.

Party affiliation provides voters with significant information about the philosophy and temperament of the judicial candidate. Republican candidates tend to construe statutes and constitutions strictly, and restrain themselves from imposing their own personal views on the law. These are the type of candidates we want to elect to judicial benches, and the information we get from party affiliation is why our party platform still promotes electing judges.

However, party affiliation coupled with the shear number of judicial offices in an urban county (100 in Harris County alone) leads to each candidate being largely anonymous, so that such candidates depend on the legal community for contributions, and on straight-ticket voting and even "a good ballot name" to get elected. When Republicans are the party in power, this process works fine, when it is not, or when the county becomes politically competitive, party affiliation alone is not adequate for electing qualified judges.

As Chief Justice Jefferson noted in his recent State of the Judiciary speech, we need to deal with this issueAinot just because of the chaotic sweeps that it tends to create every decade or so, but because the U.S. Supreme Court may force us to change if we do not deal with it first. Currently, there is a case before the Court in which the constitutionality of an elective system is under attack, in part, because of the impact political contributions from litigants has on the perception of fairness. Most lawyers were surprised when the Court accepted the case, and no one knows how broad or narrow any ruling will be. However, the case sends a warning shot to every state, like Texas, that still selects its judges through partisan elections. It is better that we start planning now for the day we will have to modify the system, rather than have a new system imposed on us by federal judges.

The County Chair should work with county chairs from Dallas and Bexar counties to come up with an alternative plan to submit to the Legislature, either in the 2009 or 2011 sessions. The plan should include consideration of ideas like moving countywide judicial elections to odd-numbered years, eliminating straight-ticket voting in such elections (like the bill recently introduced by Senator Patrick), and creating a more meaningful role for bar associations, or other professional organizations, in the candidate-evaluation process.