Citizens for Community Improvement Future Plans

Captions: 1. Pat Bowen, who is on the board for the Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement, hosted the local CCI summit. 2. Kenn Bowen, who is the secretary of the Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement Action Fund board of directors, registered participants as they came in. He’s a retired communications worker now living in Iowa City. 3. Hugh Espey, CCI's executive director, came to the summit to gauge local enthusiasm. 4. J.P. Claussen was mentioned as the only Iowa City Community School District board candidate to be endorsed by both CCI and the Save Hoover Committee.

At 4:30 p.m. on July 11, Sunday, the room at Mercer Park Aquatic Center set aside for the Citizens for Community Improvement’s local summit was packed. Kenn Bowen registered folks as they came in the door, and Pat Bowen, his wife, hosted the event. Hugh Espey, CCI’s executive director, smiled broadly as we sat down and then began taking copious notes. At times, he looked thoughtful.

We were all asked to introduce ourselves, and I stayed silent when it was my turn and had to be reminded to speak. I said my name and that I am a sustaining member of CCI.

“Oh no!” my husband cried, when I mentioned that Jim and I are sustaining members over dinner with the Bowens at Basta's, the best Italian restaurant in Iowa City.

I reminded him that I previously showed him our names on a list of CCI’s sustaining members. He must not have been able to comprehend what I said, given the enormity of my decision to support CCI on a monthly basis.

Be that as it may, CCI is a good investment in my book. I love everything that CCI does, whether it’s going after payday lenders; hog confinement operations like Prestage in Mason City, which lost their bid to pollute that environment, thanks in part to CCI’s influence, and is now trying to pollute Wright County instead; raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour, and everything else CCI does.

Jim doesn’t like some of CCI’s tactics. David Goodner, former CCI staff now moved to another state, used to get arrested a lot in Iowa CCI protests. I don’t want to get arrested and neither does Jim. But I know we support their causes. He does too. I know he does.

He's not the only one. Rod Sullivan, Misty Rebik, Paul Wittau, Evan Burger (CCI staff), Garry Klein, Tom Carsner, Bob Arbuckle, members of 100 Grannies, Carol de Prosse, and numerous others were in attendance.

Pat Bowen, a CCI executive board member, said, “It’ll take all of us, not just one person in the White House, to accomplish what needs to be done. We’re building an infrastructure. We won’t be able to elect progressives without that infrastructure. CCI endorsed Bernie Sanders. He was the only candidate who responded to our questions.

“We need universal health coverage, a raise in the minimum wage to $15 an hour, gun control, an effective coalition to stop the Bakken Pipeline, and a moratorium on the 9,000 factory farms already in existence. We need a national campaign to stop the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. Obama might try to push it through the lame-duck session.”

Certainly, Pres. Obama tried to push through the TPP before, with mostly Republicans in favor and mostly Democrats against. It's a curious position for a Democratic president to take.

Another important CCI goal is the home rule petition. Right now 3,000 signatures are required on a petition to move it forward to a ballot. State code requires 10% of the voters in the last election.

Another goal: End Citizens United. Citizens United was a Supreme Court decision that basically said money is speech and unlocked the coffers of millions of dollars in corporate campaign donations characterized by the U.S. Supreme Court as “speech.” The trouble is, once “corporations are people, my friend” [Mitt Romney quote] and once they can spend as much money as they want on elections, we are no longer a democracy but an oligarchy. The situation would be hopeless but for the fact that wealthy people like John Forbes once tried to buy an election and lost. Still, statistics show that the more money is spent on a candidate, the more likely he or she is to win the election.

CCI would also like to “fire” University of Iowa president Bruce Harreld and “fire” Iowa Board of Regents president Bruce Rastetter.

One participant spoke up for her project for picking up garbage. Her Facebook page for that purpose is “180 Pieces.”

CCI endorses Iowa City Community School District board candidate J.P. Claussen, the one candidate who endorses neighborhood schools and has a master’s degree in special education. He is also an expert in working with behavior-disordered kids. He worked with them for 10 years at West High and did such a good job that University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics hired him to work in their in-patient child and adolescent units at what is called Circle School.