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Ms. Zeneida Rita Candidate Search and Nomination Meetings Ontario New Democrats Dear Ms.

Rita, There are no words strong enough to express my displeasure with the decision (ap proved by the provincial office) of the Sarnia Lambton Riding Association to hol d the Nomination Meeting on June 22 without sufficient advance notice to the gen eral to allow their participation in a truly democratic nomination process. Total transparency in dealing with the public should be essential in a party cla iming to be "democratic"in its name. Traditionally the NDP has been faithful to the open process. Why change it now? If we are not able to engage the public at this stage how can we connect with th e electorate at the time of general election? As a potential candidate I was never consulted about the timing of the nominatio n meeting. When I talked to lovely Marla from the provincial office prior to fi ling my nomination papers I raised concern about timing and she said that she di d not think that it was too late. As it turned out even the day of our conservation it was already to late for new members to meet 30 day membership requirement for the eligibility to vote at th e nomination meeting. have I been told otherwise I simply would not file. But I still would have an issue with the exclusion of public right to fully participat e in the process ( as the cut off date for the eligibility to vote was never pub licly announced)! The choice of June 22 is particularly bad because of competing events taking pla ce at the same time. They include, but are not limited to, the Annual Senior Cruise and the Bluewater Health annual meeting. The date of the Senior Cruise was advertised well ahead of time. This event gath ers together 1000-2000 seniors. It is a community appreciation day for people who have done so much for all of us. The event is f ree to all seniors with the prize being only a smile. It was initiated by the late great Peter henderson and I have volunteered at it for decades. In recent years it has been "adopted" by SHARE (Sarnia Handicapped Aiming for rehabilitation and Equality) a long esta blished local charity. While its members are great organizers many have physical limitations. One of my normal responsibilities inc ludes clean up after the event. Last year that was completed past 10 pm due main ly to shortage of volunteers. Am I supposed to abandon my role in the event in t he event to attend nomination meeting and leave SHARE stranded short of help? The healthcare is an important issue in this election. Why should the NDP member s be faced with a choice of going to either Bluewater health or NDP meeting when such a scheduling conflict could easily be avoided? Since the date nomination meeting was publicly announced (June 6, 2011) I faced impressive interest expressed by the general public and current or expired memb ers to participate in the process. It felt as if I was a part of a significant movement evolving around the nomination meeting. Potential new members were gene rally in disbelief that they were not welcome to fully participate. Some anger showed in former members (status 4 and 5) who did not have the opportunity to r enew their lapsed membership in time to be eligible to vote. Why were they not i nformed about the cut-off date early enough to renew their membership to be ab le to fully participate? many former "standard bearers" ( including candidates from the last two provinci al elections) are ineligible to vote according the membership list provided to m

e. I firmly believe that with with a well contested, fair nomination meeting th e membership would at least triple. That would certainly help Andrea's goal of doubling 2009 membership by 2 011. While I am fairly convinced that my ll membership are excellent ( after Lambton Riding elected to a public s is critical if the party wants to chances of being nominated with current sma all I am the only New Democrat in the Sarnia office) a significant infusion of new member be competitive with PC on the election day.

The objective should be to win the election, not the nomination! At the present time I estimate that PCs have the base of committed volunteers larger than our e ntire membership. Not a good sign. Some of you think that there is a "momentum" element that may lead to the victory. Actually this momentum is just an illusion . All that happened locally in the last federal election was that we replaced L iberals as a choice for "strategic voters" for the first time in 40 years. Unti l 2008 federal election Liberals were automatic recepients of this vote as they were perceived as the only party that could defeat Conservatives. Of course I pl ayed a major role in the shift as the 2008 federal candidate, finishing for the first time in history up to that time as a New Democratic runner up. I have pre dicted the result of the 2011 election at the time when Chrissy Sinopole was the original federal candidate. Whoever the NDP candidate was going to be would g et easy picking on the election day from "strategic voters". And that is exactly what happened. And likely it will happen in the provincial election as well. If finishing second in the provincial election is your goal you may rejoice. Win ning is another matter. The reality check is quite simple. As anticipated NDP ea sily benefited from the shift in strategic voters block in the last federal elec tion. But no progress was made in gaining grounds on Conservatives who actually firmed up their support in 2011 in comparison to 2008. The only way NDP can be competitive with PC is by building stronger organization and we appear to be wasting the opportunity existing at the nomination meeting stage. If the general public is excluded from participation at this stage this building will never happen, in my humble opinion. This email is the last minute attempt to save the right approach. I am formally requesting that you reconsider the decision to hold the vote fo r nominations on June 22 and provide reasonable time lines that would allow publ ic to get involved in the process and the party to build organization in size a nd spirit that would make it look like a winner. I suggest the following steps as reasonable: 1. On June 22, at the CEPU Hall meeting the Party announces the cut off date fo r anybody interested in seeking nomination to submit their candidacy is June 30. ( yes, it would be great to have more candidates coming forward). This cut off date was never publicly announced before, in fact I do not even know when it wa s decided internally) 2. The provincial secretary reviews all the applicants and announces publicly th e names of approved candidates. 3.Once the candidates receive approval by the provincial secretary they are give n a reasonable time to reach out to the public and forgotten past membership to seek their support and get involved in building the strength of the party. The cut off date for eligibility to vote is publicly announced with all the candidat es having level playing field. And the members of the public undecided who they wish to support still can join and defer their decision to the a date of the vote. The date and voting place

are also publicly announce date the same time. I believe that a reasonable date that would allow full engagement of the public would be just after the Labour Day event. I am bringing to you this request for reconsideration on behalf of many people w ho have asked me to do so. Should the decision to vote on June 22 be reaffirmed I will stand in solidarity with those who were denied their right to participate and will withdraw from the exercise that is not fully democratic. The public has the right to know. So I make this email totally public. Yours truly, Andy Bruziewicz

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