East Coast DSA Regional Conference in New York City set for April 16, 2005

An East Coast Regional DSA conference has been set for April 16 in New York City as a part of the Left Forum. Previous regional DSA meetings were held in San Diego on March 5th and last October in Minneapolis.

Help shape DSA's Future! Join other movement activists and thinkers at a broadbased Left conference! It's a two-for-one deal!

DSA holds regional activist conferences between conventions. This year's East Coast regional confab will be held concurrently with that of a major Left gathering in New York City. It's the Left Forum, meeting on April 15-17 at the CUNY Grad Center, 365 Fifth Ave. (between 34 and 35th Sts) The DSA regional gathering, which piggybacks on the event, will be kept simple! We'll meet over two sessions of the conference, on Saturday afternoon April 16, from 12:00 noon to 4:00 pm in the same building as Left Forum.

We urge DSA members to attend both events.

DSA will hold two discussions: 1) What Is DSA's Vision and Mission? and 2) Best Practices for DSA Locals.

The Vision/Mission discussion has already begun on the dsamember listserve. It concerns not just political strategies but the nature of socialism and what is required to build a democratic socialist organization in the present period. For the DSA locals discussion we will hear briefly about what works well, including one recent successful Boston event, then try to analyze what made these work, and how other locals can adopt the successful elements, even when they cannot imitate the events themselves.

To get an idea of the scope of Left Forum and its program, visit its Web site at www.2005leftforum.org The weekend features many of DSA's own leading lights: Frances Fox Piven, Barbara Ehrenreich, Bill Fletcher and others, as well as interesting individuals and speakers from other left trends. Note that until April 11 you can register for Left Forum online at the reduced rate of $35 regular, $25 low-income, $15 student, $25 single day.

If the conference cost is a problem, especially if you only plan to attend the DSA session, please talk to us; we will make it possible.

Please help us spread the word to other DSAers in your local and elsewhere in the East. Email Theresa Alt (talt@igc.org) and Michael Hirsch (mmh@pipeline.com) and let us know your plans and DSA conference-agenda suggestions. Or you can phone Theresa at 607-273-3009. We want to get an idea of who is coming and how to shape the discussion.

Back