Burnt Orange Report

Summer Plans

By Byron LaMasters

Apologies for the light posting the past few days. I was packing and moving out of my apartment in Austin for the summer, and I just got back in Dallas this evening. I've finally more or less settled down in Dallas for the summer. I start an internship with the Dallas County Young Democrats on the 28th. It's a good opportunity because it's paying, so I'll make a little money this summer, and the position is a good opportunity for me. I'll be working on things like helping to update their webpage, working on a media strategy, planning meetings and events, fundraising, etc. I've also worked with the President of the DCYD's David Wilkins before (who is also the new Vice President of Finance of the Texas YD's (as of April) and the newly elected (as of a few weeks ago) Secretary of the Dallas County Democratic Party). Anyway, congrats on your elections, Dave. What's next? Heh.

I'll be in Dallas most of the summer, but I'll get to travel a little bit. Here's what I know so far:

Sat-Sun June 5-6: I'll be in Austin for the LGRL Pride events and the SD-14 precaucus.

Thurs-Sun, June 17-20: I'll be in Houston for the Texas Democratic Convention. I'm an alternate, but I think I'll inquire about getting press credentials since Bill Richardson and John Edwards are scheduled to attend.

Thurs-Sun, July 15-18: Family trip to Vancouver, Canada.

Thurs-Sun, July 22-25: Still debating whether to go to the convention in Boston. I did not file paperwork to be a delegate. Basically, I would like to be a delegate, but to be elected a delegate (especially in Austin) it basically requires a sustained campaign (emailing delegates, calling delegates, mailers, etc.). Since I'll be working in Dallas and I currently don't have an Austin mailing address, I figured it wasn't worth the effort (and I've already received several mailers and emails from delegates). I figured I had two things going for me. The delegate qualifying form had checkboxes for "historically underrepresented" groups, and I had two I could check (gay and under 30), but I have the fact that I'm a white male working against me, so it would have been a challenge (and there are people in SD-14 that are running that have been active in Austin politics for much longer than I). Anyway, back to the convention. I did apply for press credentials with the DNC. I'm not really expecting to get them since I'm sure there's a lot of bloggers that get a lot more traffic than we do that applied, but I figured there was nothing to lose.

Anyway, it's nice to be done with school for another year, and I'm looking forward to a nice summer of working, reading, working out, laying by the pool... *fill in the rest*.