Election Biographies: GPCA Coordinating Committee, July 2016 - June 2018

I am a second-generation Mexican-American, and also a student at California State University, Los Angeles, on a pathway to attaining a Ph.D. in Medical Anthropology. I have been a registered Green for 2.5 years,After researching the Green Party's values, I discovered that they closely matched my own beliefs, and I became actively involved with the Green Party ahead of the 2014 elections. Since then, I have organized with the Green Party of Orange County to host two landmark events and I am a Green Party of Orange County councilmember. I currently organize with other student leaders on my campus to bring about social change, including bringing gender neutral restrooms, going on strike with the California Faculty Association, and petitioning for the construction of a 21st Century Aquaponics Community farm.

 

In November 2015 I was elected to the Coordinating Committee to fill a mid-term vacancy. I support   strategies to engage the youth and Millennials, including people of color, African-Americans, Latinx/Chicanx/Boricuas, feminists, the LGBTQ communities, and Asian/Pacific Islander communities. In order to do this, I support multilingual agendas, invite rising leaders and expert facilitators, and work on a re-branding campaign that aims to address people directly. Together, we can grow the Green Party to the largest membership it has ever had. We must be attentive to the needs of these marginalized communities which have many disenfranchised people who do not vote because they do not see someone who honestly represents their best interests. 

 

Vote for me for a position within the Green Party of California Coordinating Committee, and I will breathe ambitious new energy into our collective consciousness. Peace and Harmony.

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Mike Feinstein, Santa Monica (Los Angeles County) 
(application received May 1, 2016)

I have been a Green since October 1988, was a founding member of the GPCA and co-facilitated the founding meeting; and have been involved on almost every level of the party, from Santa Monica where I live, to being one of the early global Green pioneers and eventually helping to found the Global Greens. I also served eight years on the Santa Monica City Council, including two years as Mayor.

On the Coordinating Committee I play many roles, provide initiative, capability, capacity and institutional memory. In recent years I helped lead the way for our party to get our own section of the California Elections Code, after a decade of the party trying; and I also helped lead negotiations to get the State Elections Code amended to lower the voter registration threshold to keep the smaller parties on the ballot. I also serve as the party's de facto secretary, doing a $20,000+ year job in terms of simply recording and organizing information -- and I've played a key role in the party having a clear written work plan to keep track of dates and tasks.

My strategic vision for our party is to change the electoral system so that we can be elected in proportion to our real support in society. I've been active visiting Greens around the world, and seen how we do under proportional representation systems. While we work towards that, I favor a strong focus on munipal races, and a mix of higher level races for wider visability for the party, and the ability to speak to statewide and national issues. 

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Michael Goldbeck, Carlsbad (San Diego County)
(application received May 2, 2016)

Biography and What I Wish To Accomplish on the Coordinating Committee

Personal History and Family Life: I was born in Sparta, Wisconsin to Lucille and Perry Goldbeck.  Back then, my mother was a housewife and my father worked at various jobs around the state.  I spend my first five years in the woods of Wisconsin, on my Grandfather's farm, and in the city of Madison.  My father moved to California to get work in the booming construction business.  My sister Sue, baby brother Bill, and I followed six months later.  My mother drove us there in a old Plymouth.  Twenty-five hundred miles in the winter.  Pretty gutsy. 

We lived in Westchester, by LAX, for a while before moving to Reseda in the San Fernando Valley.  My mother became a teacher working for the Los Angeles Unified School District, teaching at Reseda High School. My brother David was born in Reseda a few years later.  I spent the rest of my childhood and teenage years there until moving to Santa Monica.  After coming home to find my apartment burned up due to a careless neighbor, I moved to West Hollywood.  During the course of my work history, I lived in Los Angeles in the Eaglerock/Highland Park areas.  I married  and moved with my wife to Escondido, California.  We then moved to Encinitas where we bought a house and lived there for 27 years.  We have one daughter, Janessa, who is gay and a Marine Corps lieutenant.  After my wife and I divorced, I met my current wife and we married 5 years later.  We currently live in Carlsbad, California with our cat named  “Girl”.   My hobbies include: watching episodes and reading novels of the various incarnations of “Star Trek”; writing songs, singing, and playing guitar in a rock band called “The Lost and Found”; and writing fiction.

Work History: I lived in Hollywood for about 6 years, working in hospitals and for the Los Angeles County Assessor's office.  I also attended Control Data Institute where I trained to become a computer hardware specialist.  After my training  I went to work for Data Pathing, a subsidiary of NCR.  After spending two years with Data Pathing, I was hired by Modcomp Computer Company where I spent many hours repairing the Modcomp computers at the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena.  I worked for Modcomp for 4 years before taking a job with a start-up computer repair company: Communications Maintenance.  I became their Regional Manager for the Western States.  I became a pilot during this time and purchased an old Cessna 172 aircraft which I used to get around my territory.  After about 9 years with Communications Maintenance, I started my own repair business which lasted for about 5 years until the end of the mini-computer era.  After that I worked as a manager for an Indian statuary importing business.  I then developed a marketing company that specialized in website design.  I retired 2 years ago, so I have plenty of time to devote to the Green Party.

Political History: I met and spoke with John F. Kennedy when he was running for president.  I was so impressed by his youthful enthusiasm and friendliness that I became interested in what was happening with my country.  Along with the most of the nation, I was shocked and depressed and became pessimistic about government after his assassination.  I remember thinking that Johnson was in on the assassination.  I became apolitical after Kennedy's death and didn't get re-energized until Bobby Kennedy ran in '68.  My mother was a life-long liberal Democrat and feminist.  She also started the San Diego Democratic Club. She encouraged me to work the phone-banks for Bobby.  The day after I started on the phones, Bobby Kennedy was assassinated.  I went into another period of  political depression.  After going through the rest of the Viet Nam war years and Watergate, I finally re-awoke, politically, when Jimmy Carter ran for president.  I liked that he was a Washington outsider.  Well, Carter seem to implode with the mishandling of the Iran Hostage crisis.  I tuned out politics during Reagan's first term.  When I became aware of “Globalization” I woke up to the idiocy of this policy and began working on ways to organize people to protect jobs.  I joined Toastmasters to learn to speak in public and began writing speeches that reflected my pro-labor views.  I tried to start a labor party but found that workers were not really interested in leaving the Democratic party, even though it was in bed with the capitalists.  I did a lot of thinking about how we could have a “Healthy Democracy” and came up with the Healthy Democracy Network.  That morphed into the Home Precinct Network.  The Home Precinct Network seemed like it would work better in an already established political party.  After looking into the values and platform of the Green Party, it became apparent that the Green Party would be a very good fit for me and my ideas.  I joined the Greens in December, 2014.  I've been working to apply and promote the “Adopt Your Precinct” Green Party Membership Campaign to my precinct, San Diego County, Orange County, and at the previous GPCA Plenary.  I am currently precinct captain for my precinct: 409730, a San Diego Green Party County Council member, an SGA delegate for GPCA, Adopt Your Precinct Campaign Coordinator, and Co-Chair of GROW, and a member of the Coordinating Committee.

Why I want to serve on the Coordinating Committee: I see working in the Coordinating Committee as an opportunity to serve the Green Party by utilizing my talents in creative organization.  I'm hoping that if I am included as a Coordinating Committee member, I will be able to help in building the infrastructure of the GPCA so that it has more support, in all areas, in managing the business of the GPCA.  I'm also looking forward to helping with the strategic planning that is done in the Coordinating Committee.  I look forward to contributing to the implementation of the ten key values as well as the principles of clean government, social and economic justice, and peaceful co-existence with our fellow nations in our local, county, state, and federal governments.  It is my hope that the GPCA will become a more harmonious, effective, and efficient organization that is highly focused on bringing about the values and principles of the Green Party, through the election of  Green Party candidates.

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Bert Heuer, Crockett (Contra Costa County)
(application received May 2, 2016)

I am 58 yrs old, a husband, a father, and a grandfather. I make my living in cancer research. In the past I have served Green Party as a party member, as co-co of GIWG; I have served on Media and Budget committees, and on both CCWG and GROW.  Although I have not been particularly active of late (for health reasons), I have been a steadfast party member and have maintained my relationship with GPCA. The popularity of the Sanders campaign has restored my belief in the need for a truly progressive alternative for the citizens of CA.  It is time once again to show that that alternative is Green Party.

I wish to return to an active role in party management.  Hence my interest in the Coordinating Committee position. I understand the party, its hopes, its dreams, its functions, and its dysfunctions. I intend to resume where I left off a few years ago: to speak my mind, to consider all opinions, and to deal squarely and fairly. Please give me the opportunity to once again help set the course for GPCA. Thank you for your consideration.

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Sasha Karlik, Los Angeles (Los Angeles County)
(application received May 1, 2016)

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Matt Leslie, Fullerton (Orange County)
(application received May 2, 2016)

Biography:  Matthew has a history of activism and volunteerism within the Green Party at the state and local level.  He currently serves on the GPOC County Council and has been on the GPCA Coordinating Committee in the past.  He had regularly attended state plenaries as a delegate and now serves as a member of the SGA.  In the past he has been a member of the Campaigns and Candidates Working Group and served on the ad hoc Campaign Finance Committee.  He has attended three Presidential Nominating Conventions as a delegate.  

Matthew promotes the Green Party in many ways.  He has volunteered to table for the GPOC at local events, collected signatures to get Greens on the ballot for state office and for a state minimum wage initiative spearheaded by the GPCA, and has acted as a campaign manager for his life partner, Jane Rands, running as a Green for State Assembly in 2010 and in non-partisan City Council elections in 2012, 2014, and now 2016.

What he will do on the CC:  Matthew is an experienced facilitator who is respectful of others even when contentious issues arise.  The Green Party has a solid platform founded on the Ten Key Values.  Greens have been in the forefront of LGBT rights, immigrant rights, worker rights, healthcare for all, housing, and food security, and so many other issues meant to ensure all peoples’ needs are met.  Though these goals are common to all Californians, the Green Party has struggled through many challenges internal and external to the Party to maintain and grow Party registration.

Matt will work for stability within the Party to enable Greens throughout the state to concentrate their energies on growing the Greens into a diverse and inclusive Party whose makeup mirrors the people that make up our communities.  With an expanded cohesive Party membership, Greens can more effectively support local and national candidates.

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Mike Murphy, San Francisco (San Francisco County)
(application received May 2, 2016)

I moved to San Francisco nearly twenty years ago from the Seneca Nation Reservation in New York. I was Green in NY and registered Green in SF. I have been active in the SF Green Party working on voters' rights and environmental issues for the past several years.