I’m sitting here in the hotel typing this on my phone. I need to process Convention.

I attended the 2019 National Convention under the assumption that either 70/30 or Pass the Hat would be successful. Hell, there were people concerned both would pass. I hoped that this Convention would finally give us the money and resources we need.

Small and struggling chapters got hella screwed this weekend.

At this point it doesn’t seem feasible for me to do the type of organizing work I want to do in my local. I am happy that the housing resolutions passed and Organizing the Unorganized passed. There’s a lot of political work I wish I could work on. But without a way to do these things, without somebody to help us pay for these activities, I can’t see us doing them in my chapter. Organizing costs money. Who will buy the clipboards? The paper? The printed items? The water? The food? The ink pens? The canvassing bags? Who will buy us a Zoom account? Who will pay for us to rent out a space where we are allowed to do political work — which our library forbids? Where are we supposed to get merch? Campaign-in-a-box method charges chapters money for organizing guides. The M4A thing was $55 last I checked. We can’t do that. Especially not for every activity.

When I had a steadier job, I used to pay for a lot of DSA stuff out of my own pocket. I bought things like tablecloths and plastic literature display things for tabling because I was embarrassed having an ugly table at events. So I broke down and just bought it myself. My aunt asked me what I wanted for Christmas and I said a 5ft folding table. That’s how I got the table we’ve used for many events. My mom got me a bullhorn as a birthday gift once. That’s how our chapter got the bullhorn. I bought a Palestine flag, trans flag, and rainbow flag online. I bought a gavel online. Office Depot had whiteboards on clearance so I bought two big ones. I bought a big plastic box and organized all our stuff. I’ve gone to the dollar tree for poster board runs, I’ve gone to the paint store for paint runs. When our chapter did a banner drop over city hall to protest the camping ban ordinance alongside a local trans org, I paid for the banner and the spray paint. It was a canvass drop cloth from the hardware store that I cut in half. Other comrades have also done things like this.