The Elly Report: State Committee

Town & Ward Committees: A Call to Action

In order to rebuild the Republican Party in Massachusetts it is critical that Town & Ward Committee members fully understand their purpose and role within the Republican Party structure. With this renewed understanding town committee members will have a greater ability to focus on the duties of building the grassroots at the local level.

Purpose
The Republican Town Committee is not a committee of politically interested individuals who get together every few months to discuss or debate the issues of the day. The Town Committee is the Republican Party for your town and needs to act as a highly partisan organization to recruit and elect Republican candidates. Don't think of yourselves as a Republican Town Committee, but rather as the Republican Party for your town!

The Town Committee exists to elect Republicans to public office, period. All activities your committee undertakes should in some way work towards this goal.

Electing Republicans to office in your town may sound like an impossible task but there are several things you can do to work towards that goal. These five core responsibilities will help build the party in your town and give you a greater ability to elect Republican candidates:

Build & maintain a vibrant local Party organization
Recruit candidates for municipal and legislative office
Communicate the Republican message in your local media
Grow the Republican base with aggressive voter registration programs
Get out the Republican vote on Election Day

Recruit Members
To turn your committee into an organization that can impact local elections I recommend that you begin by recruiting members to join your committee and then hold monthly meetings to keep them interested. The more members you have who are motivated, the greater your ability is to make an impact.

Recruit Candidates
Recruit candidates to run for local and legislative offices. Running candidates is the only way to win and this will give your committee members campaigns to get involved with to keep them focused. By assisting candidates with volunteers and GOTV efforts it will be easier to recruit candidates down the road and eventually elect a Republican to office in your town. You want your Committee to be an asset to the candidates who run in your town.

Submit Letters & Press Releases
Submit letters to the editor and write press releases to counter the Democrats "puff" pieces in your local paper. By offering different view points and challenging the Democrats on their records you will begin to chip away at the image of the incumbent which will help whoever runs against him/her in the future.

Get Out the Vote
And finally, Get Out the Republican Vote on Election Day for all Republican candidates running in your town through phone calls and mailings using the Campaign Portal. By helping candidates with this activity you will be directly contributing to their campaign. No Republican candidate will win in Massachusetts without solid support from their base.

Party Structure
Town & Ward Committees must understand their role in the Party's overall structure. There are many things that can be done best at the State or National Party but there are also things that need to be done locally.

For instance, it makes less sense for the small staff at the State Party to spend time conducting GOTV phone calls when they can be advising local committees on how to most effectively implement a GOTV plan. Likewise, it does not make sense for each local party committee to design and print its own promotional materials for a statewide candidate, when those candidates or the State Party can use its purchasing power to produce the same product much more cheaply.

In order to work together it is important that we understand what is expected at each level of the Republican leadership chain, so we minimize duplication and maximize our collective output.

National Republican Party

Recruits and serves as primary source of support for Presidential candidates
Recruits and serves as primary source of support for Congressional candidates
Markets Republican brand-name & candidates in national media
Assists State Parties in developing into successful organizations

State Republican Party

Provides Republican information to activists and organizations statewide
Recruits and serves as primary source of support for statewide candidates
Recruits and serves as primary source of support for state Senate candidates
Assists town parties in becoming successful organizations
Conducts statewide GOTV program in legislative election years
Markets Republican brand-name & candidates in statewide media
Provides training and advisory assistance to legislative and county candidates

Town/Ward Republican Party

Recruits and serves as primary source of support for state House candidates
Recruits and serves as primary source of support for municipal candidates
Leads GOTV "ground game" on behalf of all candidates
Registers new Republican voters
Markets Republican brand-name & candidates in local media

Campaign Portal
The State Party is working hard to help you build your committees into organizations that can effectively recruit and elect candidates but it is up to you to make it happen. The Campaign Portal allows you to identify the Republicans in your town so that you can target them with phone calls and mailings so please make sure you have access to it. If you don't, contact your local State Committee representative.

Please make certain that your committee members fully understand their purpose and role in the Party. As you know, you and your committee members are essential and we will not become a successful Party without your efforts. Please feel free to contact me at msthilaire@massgop.com or 617-523-5005 if you have any questions or would like to discuss your committee more specifically.