GPCA Media Pages

This page contains specifics about the Media Committee, its business, and personnel

GPCA Spokesperson

The term of a spokesperson is not defined; spokespeople may serve as long as they stay active in the Green Party and are available for press correspondence.

If a spokesperson is running for or elected to government office, he or she must step down as spokesperson for the duration of their campaign and/or term in government office. This applies only to those running for government office such as school board, Congress, Assembly, etc. and does not include those running for or serving in internal positions within the Green Party, such as on a County Council or Coordinating Committee. A former spokesperson shall be automatically re-instated as spokesperson once an unsuccessful campaign for government office has ended.

Susan King

Susan King has been very active in the Green Party for many years. She has served on the San Francisco Green Party County Council since 2000, was a Co-Coordinated the Green Party of California's Campaigns & Candidates Working Group, was the Northern California Field Director for Nader 2000. She currently serves on the Bicycle Advisory Committee as the District 5 representative, advising the city on bicycle-related policies in San Francisco. She also ran for Supervisor in 2004, where she placed 9th in a field of 22. The seat was won by fellow Green Ross Mirkarimi, in an election that used instant runoff voting (IRV). In addition to many hours of volunteer work, Susan has devoted most of her professional career to fundraising for non-profit and advocacy organizations, including the California League of Conservation Voters, the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors, the Women's Building, and most recently Community Leadership Academy Emergency Response (CLEAR), an organization that helps people whose family members have been victims of street violence.

As a member of the San Francisco Green Party County Council, Susan has been on radio, television, and in newspapers speaking on behalf of the party. She recently appeared on KTVU-TV Channel 2 10 O'Clock News, and was also heard statewide when she was interviewed for The California Report, a radio news segment that airs on all NPR affiliates in California.

Dr. Bob Vizzard

Bob Vizzard is an emergency physician and native Californian from Bakersfield. He was educated in Californian public schools and is now a resident of Placer County. He has been a Green since 2000. Bob has been politically active since his teen years, when he was involved in the civil rights movement and farm labor movement in Bakersfield when he was 17. The War in Vietnam was probably the most formative of his core politics. He came to understand early in his life that both major political parties represented the same corporate interests and were not amenable to reform from within. He supposes it was the Nader run that convinced him that a third party movement might be possible in the US.

Active in the movement for single payer healthcare, Bob was the initial author and presenter of the Green Party Health Care Platform. Bob is a County Council Member in Placer Co. and Alternate Rep. for the Northern Section of the Central Dist of GPCA. He ran for State Senate in the 4th State Senatorial Dist which covers about 1/3 of Northern California geographically. It was that experience that taught him that the Green Party has tremendous opportunity to speak compellingly on all issues. It also taught him that we are rarely given access to the public microphone and that we are often not ready to capitalize on that opportunity when it occurs. That is why he wants to participate in the Media Committee. He is especially interested in seeing the Media Committee develop methodology to help the locals to become more effective in using local media.

Daniel Brezenoff

Daniel is a clinical social worker from New York who now lives in Long Beach, California. He was the Green Party candidate for California's 37th Congressional District in the Special Election of August 2007. He placed third in that race, with over 5% of the vote. Born in 1971 and raised in a family of labor and civil rights activists, Daniel has been active in civil rights, peace, environmental and labor movements since childhood. Daniel has been heard speaking about his candidacy and the Green Party on KPFK, the Pacifica station in Los Angeles, and on local cable shows. Daniel writes a weekly column for LBpost.com, and has also had political pieces published in the LA Times and Long Beach Press-Telegram. A percussionist and poet for 25 years, Daniel is involved in the art and performance community in Los Angeles as a performer and organizer. In addition to coordinating an outpatient program at a psychiatric hospital, Daniel maintains a private practice as a therapist, consultant, and community educator.

Crescendo Vellucci (Press Secretary)

Cres Vellucci has been the GPCA's Press Secretary since 2003. He is a former, and longtime (1960s - 1990s) major daily newspaper reporter and editor, and was political correspondent/bureau chief of a wire service which covered the governor and the legislature at the State Capitol. He was also a war correspondent in Vietnam. He has owned a large public relations firm and is a former chief administrator for a private law school. He has spent much of the past 15 years assisting non-profit and social justice groups - from anti-war to immigrants rights to labor and environmental - garner local and national media coverage. He is a current member of the board of directors of the ACLU/Sacramento, and formerly operated a civil liberties organization providing legal aid to social justice activists. Since 2004 he has either served as campaign manager or media strategist for nearly a dozen Green Party congressional, state and local campaigns. He orchestrated the first use of radio and television advertising for GPCA congressional and state candidates.

He's current a member of the GPCA Finance and Budget Committees, and is active in creating direct mail fundraising for the party. He is also on the Sacramento Green Party County Council.

Erika McDonald (Media Committee Co-Coordinator)

Erika is the spokesperson for the San Francisco Green Party, where she currently serves on the County Council. Active in the Green Party since the fall of 2000, Erika has served as Co-Coordinator of the Green Party of California Media Committee since the committee was first officiated in 2004. Currently working to elect Green Party member Mark Sanchez as District 9 Supervisor in San Francisco, Erika served on the steering committee of the Patricia Gray for Congress campaign in 2004, was a district captain in the 2003 campaign to elect Matt Gonzalez Mayor of San Francisco, and volunteered in the Ralph Nader for President Campaign in 2000. Erika cut her activist teeth as a young adult by volunteering for grassroots feminist organizations such as the Women's Action Coalition (WAC) and the National Organization for Women (NOW). Erika has been quoted numerous times in the San Francisco Chronicle, has been featured in FogCityJournal.com, has appeared on KRON-TV and KPIX-TV and heard on KPFA-FM and KALW-FM. Her original essays have appeared in ZNET, FogCityJournal.com and the book Go Matt Go, Stories from the People of the Matt Gonzalez for Mayor Campaign.

Erika was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, spent her childhood in Illinois, her teenage years in the South, and has lived most of her adult life in California. She works full-time doing research for a communications company, is married to fellow Green John-Marc Chandonia and has a baby girl, Amy Elizabeth Chandonia.

Committee Duties and Authority

According to Green Party of California Bylaws, Section 7-7, the following governs the Media Standing Committee:

7-7.1 Duties and Authority

- The Media Standing Committee is charged with facilitating all GPCA communications

- The Media Standing Committee shall develop and distribute media releases that express positions in accordance with the GPCA platform; coordinate press conferences around significant figures and issues; draft and distribute notifications of significant, newsworthy events relevant figures, platforms and growth.

- The Media Standing Committee serves under the direction Assembly of the GPCA and the Coordinating Committee.

- The Media Standing Committee assists local chapters of the GPCA to develop media resources.

7-7.2 Membership

The Media Standing Committee is a standing committee with up to 8 members, in accordance with bylaws 6-1.4^*. Co-Coordinators are selected in accordance with bylaws 6-1.9.

7-7.3 Ex Officio Members

The Green Party of California's Press Secretary and designated Spokespeople are non-voting members of the Media Committee.

^*6-1.4 Committee Membership

Coordinating Committee (CC) membership is defined in Section 7-1. Other Committees shall be composed of no more than eight members not including ex officio members (see ex officio members, paragraph 6- 1.7). At least once a year or whenever vacancies exist, the active counties, Group coordinators, and individual CC members shall be given the opportunity to submit nominations or recommendations to the Coordinating Committee for committee membership. Eligible candidates must have attended at least two prior plenaries within the previous 24 months and demonstrate a working knowledge of the GPCA bylaws and operating procedures. Committee members shall be appointed by the Coordinating Committee and shall serve for two years or the remainder of the current term, or if appointed more than 12 months after the start of the current term, shall serve for the remainder of the current term plus two more years, unless a successor is appointed before this time. Terms begin and end at the start of the second plenary of each year and must be staggered whenever possible. Any Committee member may be recalled with a 2/3 vote of the CC.

Media Standing Committee

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Committee Members

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