Our newest chapter, located in the most northern part of our state, had an interesting  weekend last week, decided to take an opportunity to table at a music festival in northern Kentucky. The festival is located at the longest continuing operating drag strip in the country, and is a diverse collection of self-described beardos.

Many, due to the nature of the festival, the feel of the music, and the sense of community, have dubbed the festival a yearly "Woodstock in Morningview", although members felt that perhaps "Bluegrass Bonnaroo" was a more appropriate nick name for the Whispering Beard Festival. Regardless though, this was a curious crowd that brought in people from all over the state.

The Northern Kentucky chapter used this event as a chance to let people the destruction of Mountain Top Removal, giving away buttons that said I Love Mountains and Stop Mountaintop Removal, selling KFTC t-shirts, books about the destructive practice, and cds.

All weekend members were talking to beardos (some familiar with our work, some not), and running into members from all over the state. There were members from Whitesburg set up talking about their music and art, and directing their customers to our booth about some of the issues facing Eastern Kentucky. There were other members who came up by chance and picked up unscheduled shifts at the booth, and directed as many of their friends over as possible.

Each member had their own approach. Some waited as people came by to look at the signs asking people to stop mountain top removal, some stopped people to hand them buttons, some pointed people to a map detailing the overlap between poverty and strip mining, and still some stopped any willing to show  the photographs showing the destruction of paradise. As member Scott Goebel told many prospective members, "Are you familiar with the John Denver song 'Almost Heaven, West Virginia?' Well, here's a picture of a home where people thought they had Almost Heaven, and ended up with Almost Level."

By the end of the weekend the Northern Kentucky chapter recruited 25 new members, raised over $250, and put over 90 people in touch with our great organization. Here, surrounded by good bands, friendly faces, and a number of beards, the Northern Kentucky chapter found fertile ground to begin growing new power.

We've just launched new kftc.org chapter pages for both our new Scott County Chapter and our Northern KY Chapter. 

We'll continue to add to them over the course of the next few weeks with input from the members of both chapters and the pages will stay active with feeds from both our blog and calendar of events.

About thirty people gathered in Georgetown this weekend to speak out in favor of restoring voting rights to former felons who have served their debt to society.  

The demonstration of KFTC members and friends happened just outside of Canewood Golf Course in Georgetown during a fundraiser hosted by Senator Damon Thayer, the person most directly responsible for holding up legislation that would enfranchise former felons.

The Georgetown News-Graphic covered the event with a great story and all of the people in the neighborhood who stopped to talk to us were very supportive - including one woman who lived in the neighborhood who had a brother who is a former felon.

KFTC members in both the Scott County and Northern Kentucky chapters say they will continue to put pressure on Senator Thayer to allow HB 70 to come to a vote until he does the right thing. 

Scott County KFTC members will follow up this event with a monthly chapter meeting this Thursday (7pm at St. John Church) and are planning a big Gospel Fest event focused on Voting Rights on Saturday, July 31st at 5pm at the Ed Davis Learning Center

Northern KY KFTC members are planning a series of community tabling events in Southern Kenton County - also part of Thayer's district. 

Thanks to Bree Tracy for taking the fantastic photos of the event!

On the block of Liberty Row there has been a movement from the residents to reclaim their neighborhood, and to make Newport a better place to live. This year the outreach of several dedicated residents, and with the help of ally organizations like the folks at the Brighton Center and Kentuckians For The Commonwealth, created a great event that began a discussion of the issues that plague Newport.

One of the chief organizers of the event, and KFTC member, Kyle Randall was especially pleased with the event saying that, "It couldn't have been as great as it was without the help that community organizations bring," pointing to the amount of volunteers and time that the Brighton Center was able to put into this event.

Of course Brighton Center Community Organizer Justin Lawrence pointed to the work of community members noting the work of people like Kyle and fellow resident Jennifer Noel's tireless efforts in reaching across the community to find support from sponsors. These community members made the most of this opportunity, and knew exactly what that meant.

“This event really builds great social capital across these new neighbors, allowing people to mix and mingle. It was a great place to talk about the issues affecting the neighborhood, and begin to create something really great," noted Justin, observing the various children and parents playing games of corn hole and tossing water balloons in the street.  

The success of the event came as a surprise to many of those involved, noting that the 70 who showed this year were well over double the number from the year before. Many of those involved thanked the help that KFTC was able to provide, registering voters, providing a small action, and more importantly protecting the food during brief rain showers that threatened the event.

This success has many people looking forward to starting the planning for next year even earlier, and they hope that KFTC will be back. Kyle Randall in particular mentioned that he was hoping to have a more official role next year in the planning of the event, and summarizing the feeling of all of those who came out saying,  “It just feels good to have an impact on your neighborhood, and seeing it get better.”

 Last night, twenty Northern KY KFTC members came together to petition to officially become KFTC's 13th Chapter.  It was an energetic, positive meeting with many new members, despite  beginning just an hour after Primary Election polls closed.

Before moving forward, we took a look back at what we've been able to accomplish in the five short months since we've been meeting regularly in the community.  Members shared stories of lobbying in Frankfort with KFTC, including the Voting Rights Lobby Day, and I Love Mountains Day, we recounted our Budget Bake Sale at NKU, our Yard Sale Fundraiser, Euchre for Justice Fundraiser, voter mobilization phone banks, and community festivals.

With that history in mind and many hopes for what we'll be able to accomplish in the Future, Nina Boskin lead the official vote for us to become a Chapter with all of the responsibilities that come along with that and the vote was a unanimous "yes."

"This might sound a little sappy,  but I really feel like there's a growing sense of community amongst this group.  It's great." - Rick Traud

We elected a strong slate of local leaders:

Steering Committee Representative Scott Goebel
Steering Committee Alternate Antonio Mazzaro
Publicity Co-Coordinators Amy Beth Able and Jean Caudill
Membership Coordinators Carrie Ann Welsh and Nina Bosken
Fundraising Co-Coordinators Alex Searles and Virginia Johnson

Upcoming NKY KFTC Events

May 20th – Deep Down Showing at the Newport Library at 7pm

May 22nd – KFTC Steering Committee Meeting, Hazard, KY where NKY KFTC members will submit their petition to become a chapter.

May 24th –First Day of the Special Legislative Session in Frankfort.  We’ll have a big rally for comprehensive, progressive tax reform on the first day of the session with allies at 5pm.

June 22-26 – Social Forum, Detroit

June 15th – NKY KFTC Meeting.  Florence City Building (or other location TBA), 7pm

June 25th – Dry Ridge.  Owen County Electric Annual Meeting

June 26th - Euchre For Justice (II) Fundraiser at the home of Joe Gallenstein

Election Day is here!

We're a little more than half-way through, with good ground work happening all over the state.

In Bowling Green, folks are making the last of their voter mobilization calls.

In Louisville, we just had a big voter mobilization motorcade, go through four neighborhoods, reminding people to vote.

Folks there are also still making voter mobilization calls and giving rides to the polls.  

In Eastern Kentucky, Perry County members are investigating a vote-buying scheme in the county from which several people say they've received $20 for a pledge to vote for particular candidates.  We've been notifying authorities to try to get them shut down.  The Lexington Herald-Leader is running a piece about vote-buying reports all over the state.  More on this soon.

In Lexington, two members are making calls to our member list, reminding them to get out and vote.

In Scott County, members passed out Voter Guides on Main St in the morning and are making a few of their last calls.

In Northern Kentucky, folks are passing out Voter Guides and getting ready for their big Chapter Formation meeting tonight at 7pm.

In Madison County, we've been passing out voter guides, and giving out the phone number to the local cab company who's giving out free rides to the polls. 

  

  

We started organizing in Northern KY in earnest late last year, bringing together the first monthly community meeting in January of this year.  

Just 4 months after that, KFTC members in Northern Kentucky are ready to make the leap to become KFTC's official 13th Chapter!

The Chapter's primary area is in Kenton, Campbell, and Boone Counties, but KFTC members and friends from bordering counties or even Cincinnati are welcome to attend.

Northern KY KFTC Chapter formation Meeting

Tuesday, May 18th

7pm

Florence City Building

(8100 Ewing Blvd., over between the water park and the skate park).

At the meeting, we'll  petition to become KFTC's 13th chapter in the state and elect a few key positions including a Steering Committee Representative and Alternate. 

For more information, contact - Dave Newton 859-420-8919 or Dave@kftc.org

Yesterday, Saturday, May 15 was a pretty unremarkable day in most respects.  For us, collectively as Kentuckians For The Commonwealth, there wasn't anything singularly huge on the calendar, but we decided to try to compile quick stories about a lot of little things that happened throughout the day and present them as this - A Day in the Life of KFTC. 

At 7 a.m. KFTC members in northern Kentucky came together outside of Ockerman Middle School in Florence to start setting up tables for the big Relay for Life yard sale.  Alex Searles organized the KFTC table, but eight members participated in all, selling items that they donated to the  cause and passing out information about KFTC.  They also invited those interested to the big NKY KFTC Chapter Formation meeting on Tuesday.  By the end of the event at 4 p.m., they brought in $150 and made a lot of key contacts with new people.  Members also left with KFTC Voter Guides to hand out over the next few days.

At 10 a.m. the KFTC booth at the Butchertown Art Fair in Louisville got rolling.  Many of the candidates for mayor were there and most of them dropped by the KFTC table to say hello.  The event was in a neighborhood where KFTC does a lot of work, so many people at the festival  recognized us, and cheered for KFTC.  It gave a lot of our members who don't volunteer with us every month a chance to drop by and plug into our work.  A few people said they'd been meaning to join KFTC and took membership envelopes or joined on the spot.  Others asked about voting locations and we made lists of people to call back on Monday with that information.   Nine hours later, at 7 p.m., we packed up and headed home. 

At 10:30 a.m. a workshop started at the Pine Mountain Sustainability Symposium on "Steps Towards Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy" the workshop was facilitated by KFTC leaders Carl Shoupe and Roy Silver, among others.  This was just one of many events our members participated in throughout the powerful three-day conference designed to bring together specialists, practitioners, educators, and organizers to share their experiences and learn about model projects throughout southeastern Kentucky.  The symposium included hands-on trainings, workshops, woodland hikes, and garden tours with local and regional experts working on food, energy, and forest issues.

At noon, Tyler Birdwhistell and Bethany Baxter met in downtown Georgetown to go door-to-door in the Scroggin Park Housing Authority neighborhood - passing out KFTC Voter Guides and letting people know where their voting location is.   After about two hours, they had covered half of the neighborhood, which was enough for a couple of us to come back the next day and finish it up in an hour and a half. 

"I ran into one woman who is a former felon - so she'd had her right to vote taken away from her when she was much younger.  She told me the she worked for years to get her right to vote back and that she almost gave up a few times.  But she got them back during the Patton administration and has voted ever since." - Tyler Birdwhistell

At 3 p.m. a small group of KFTC folks visited the Peace and Global Citizenship Fair at Bluegrass Community Technical College in Lexington.  It was a great event organized by BCTC’s Students for Peace and Earth Justice.  For our part, we canvassed the crowd with a big stack of KFTC Voter Guides, asking people to cast an informed vote on Tuesday.  Kudos to BCTC’s Students for Peace and Earth Justice for putting together a great event that is getting a bit bigger every year. 

At 4 p.m. the Madison County KFTC members kicked off their Spring Friendraiser, with more than 70 people enjoying a potluck, cornhole and games, a great silent auction, live music by Mudpi, a short program about the awesome work of KFTC, and apparently a game that involved more than a little rolling around in the mud.  Members brought in $700 in donations and had a lot of fun before winds picked up and a hailstorm heralded an early end to the event.  We'll likely have a separate blog entry on this exciting event in the next few days, so stay tuned.  

In addition to all of that, members ran voter mobilization phone banks throughout the day in Bowling Green, Louisville, and in at-large (non-chapter) areas of the state, to name a few places, and members passed out KFTC Voter Guides or handbills about the election at events and in their neighborhoods throughout the commonwealth.  

No doubt, our 6,000+ members across the state accomplished an awful lot in the name of social justice on Saturday that will never make it to this blog - conversations with neighbors, writing letters to elected officials, etc.

It's a lot of little things, but this was just one day.  And day after day in community after community, it adds up.  So keep at it folks. 

What can we do tomorrow?

Kentucky's Primary Election is two weeks from today, falling on Tuesday, May 18th.  Polls will be open across the state from 6am to 6pm.

If you'll be out of the county you're registered in on election day, you can arrange to vote in advance at your County Clerk's office or you can vote by mail.  Just contact your County Clerk's office to make arrangements.

Expect to get your Voter Guide from KFTC in the mail shortly and our KentuckyElection.org website will be fully up and running within a few days.

Over the next few weeks, KFTC members will be calling our entire membership rolls, plus everyone who has registered to vote with us or signed a petition on one of our issues - asking them all to cast an informed vote on election day.  If you'd like to volunteer to help call members, give rides to the polls on election day, or otherwise help out, please contact your local KFTC organizer.

In just the last few days, we've had great phone banks in Bowling Green, Northern Kentucky, and Louisville.  We're looking forward to having many more and we could always use a hand. 

Earlier this month, the growing KFTC Northern Kentucky group held its first public event at Northern Kentucky University.  The Budget Bake Sale was a great success in raising awareness for students about tax justice in Kentucky as an alternative to more damaging cuts to higher education.  Member Gale Ossenbeck baked some amazing treats to sell and we raised $38 in two hours at the NKU Student Union that we’ll be donating to the KY Dept. of Revenue to help with the projected $1.5 billion shortfall over the next two years. 

The alternative to tax reform being considered in the General Assembly is another round of devastating budget cuts to higher education that will increase class size, reduce class choices, and shortchange Kentucky’s future.  We even got the chance to lobby President James Votruba to support House Bill 13 and he said “He’ll look into it further.”  We also collected a page of signatures for a petition supporting HB 13 and students filled out a few dozen postcards to deliver to Governor Beshear.  

KFTC Members Sean Henry, Gale Ossenbeck, and Dennis Chaney helped make this first event a success and this won’t be the last.

                                           - Dennis Chaney, Northern KY KFTC Member