Good morning!
This is the weekly DKos Asheville open thread where we try to get together every Saturday morning around eleven, and then drift in and out throughout the day. We hope this group serves to reinvigorate us locally and regionally here on Daily Kos, building on the sense of community that's grown through our online engagement. DKos Asheville can give us all a better sense of connection, a better understanding of who these people are that we stand with, work with, and share with in the political process. We hope, through this community, that we can do a better job of leveraging our orange passion for progressive politics to help elect more and better Democrats.
If you would like to host a weekly open thread, please let us know.
Well, unfortunately we were unsuccessful in our ambitious effort to get a voter registration event organized for today. We still don't have a venue. We haven't heard any more on Earthfare; and while the North Asheville Tailgate Market is a great idea, it doesn't actually start up this season until April 5th. Further, the hours for that market appear to be 8:00am until Noon; which might be a bit of a problem.
Still, I like the idea for trying to get space at farmers markets, and there are quite a few around Asheville on various days of the week. I'm guessing that there would probably not be wifi available, so we wouldn't be able to look up registration information and voting locations for folks; but there do seem to be a number of other advantages, one of which would be shopping for food while we're there!
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Coincidentally enough, this morning there is a new article posted on Mountain Xpress on starting your own local farmers market. It's a short article, but if you've been thinking about the idea of a farmers market in your neighborhood, this piece can give you a start. MountainX also has a longer article up, published yesterday, about the Oakley Farmers Market; a much more detailed account of starting up a market and what it can do for community. And of course the main source on local farmers markets, CSA's, food, etc is BuyAppalachian.org.
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Martin Nesbitt died this week. He was the North Carolina senator for senate district 49, which includes much of Buncombe County. When Democrats last controlled the Senate, Nesbitt was our majority leader. The Citizen-Times article is here.
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Our fifth quarterly DKos Asheville Meetup is scheduled for Saturday, May 3rd, at 1:00. We'll once again be back at the Bywater on the French Broad River in Asheville. If you plan to attend, or if you're thinking about it, send a kosmail to Randy, randallt, and he'll put you on the list in the Connect*Unite*Act community diaries. We already have ten folks signed up plus two maybe's.
Hi folks, randallt here. The weather is going to be gorgeous for the next several days in the mountains and foothills of Western North Carolina. I tried to get us a place at Eathrfare for today but I never heard back from our contact there after three attempts. I think Saturdays have a pretty full schedule there but am still disappointed that we aren't out there someplace to register voters. I love the farmers market idea but like David said, those don't open up till later in the Spring. But never fear, we will keep looking for a place.
I was at The Bywater this week to firm up our May 3rd facilities. The owners are excited to have us back and the area where we have been in the past is spruced up with a new awning and tables. Stay tuned for more details going forward. Have a wonderful day!
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And as a reminder, we now have a google group for DKos Asheville, setup for the purpose of making it easier for us to send messages to group members. We'll use it to send reminders of the Saturday open threads, meetups, voter registration events, etc. If you would like to be added to the google group, kosmail me an email address and I will send you an invite. Note, this is a private group and your email address will not be public. Remember to check your email for the google invite.
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Enjoy your day!
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