The Rally
Our rally on 7/7 was a success. We are not sure if it was the ice cream (thanks Pam!), the music (thanks Spencer and Jon!), or the passion of our activists (thank you all!), but nearly everyone involved in the planning and execution of this event agreed that it was one of the best displays of community activism we have been a part of. The rally organization was led by AJQ member Susan Yuang, and it was carried out by a great team. People lent their talents and their stuff. We had tables, tents, chairs, coolers of water, and an ocean of clipboards, petitions, and pens.
We had some great speeches that I hope our elected leaders take a few minutes to listen to.
Of course, the main goal of the rally, of our efforts for the past 20 days or so, has been to collect signatures to repeal the ordinances that establish these raises into Quincy’s law. After the rally, the counting began. We want to thank everyone for their patience these past weeks while waiting for an update. There were many opinions on how public we should make the ongoing count. It was decided to be forthcoming with the count. The problem was we didn’t know it at that point. As of the end of the rally, we had no idea how close, or far, we were from our goal. Maggie reported in a blog post that we had about 4500 signatures on the mayoral petition as of Monday morning. The number was slightly lower for the city council petition. Since we were over 1/2 way there we decided to use the grace period that was initially given to us by the clerk’s office. People have been collecting and submitting signatures at a furious pace these last two days.
We do not anticipate making it to 12% of the registered voters. However, I would love to be wrong!
There are several reasons that collecting signatures was not as easy as we hoped it would be.
Getting busy people to stop and discuss political matters is tough. The nation is polarized, the public’s faith in elected officials is low, and their willingness to engage with the peculiar people with clipboards. Even Americans’ opinions of local governments, which has been consistently higher than their federal or state counterparts over time, has slipped since Covid.
The law that outlines this process provided a very short time frame while requiring numerous signatures. Specifically, we needed 12% (about 8000) of Quincy’s registered voters to sign within 20 days. As a comparison, to run for a municipal office in Quincy, you need 50 registered voter signatures to sign your nomination form within approximately two months.
This 20-day period happened at the onset of Summer and over the Independence Day holiday. This is a time when average folks tend to be unavailable. People travel now. Families transition from school schedule to vacation mode. The weather sends people to the beaches and golf courses etc.
We heard from so many residents who were nervous about signing the petition because they, or a loved one, worked for the city. This was covered in a previous blog post.
We promised signers we would not turn in the petitions unless we had acquired enough signatures to repeal the ordinance(s). So, since we most likely will not turn in the petition, we will keep collecting signatures and let the citizens of Quincy express their opinion all the way up till the next city council session. It is my hope that the city council will see how upset the people they represent are and will choose to repeal the ordinances on their own. Then a legitimate, trusted process, that includes citizen input and logical financial analysis, can be used to find fair salary increases for the position of mayor and city council.
~Joe Murphy
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Thank you all!
