OntheWilderSide

Howie Hawkins will announce his candidacy for Governor at a press conference in Albany on Tuesday May 4th at 12:30 PM. The press conference will be in the LCA press room (Rm. 130) of the Legislative Office Building , Swan and State Sts., Albany .

Hawkins promises to “tax Wall Street in order to invest in Main Street .” He will call for progressive tax reforms to close the state budget deficit, restore cuts to schools and other public services, share revenues with local governments, and provide “jobs for all at living wages” in public works and services. Like most New Yorkers, he is disgusted by the climate of political corruption and special interests that dominates the state Capitol and believes it is time for wholesale changes. He is a strong supporter of ethics reform, as well as full campaign financing and proportional representation.

He will also call for “public enterprise in key areas of the economy as the most efficient and democratic means of economic renewal and security,” including a single-payer health service, public power utilities, and a state bank to target new productive investments into a sustainable green economy based on renewable energy, mass transit, sustainable agriculture, and green industries. The state bank would also  refinance mortgages on affordable terms for the tens of thousands of New York homes facing foreclosure.

Hawkins wants to ban hydrofracking for natural gas and shut down New York ‘s aging nuclear power plants as fast as replacement power in renewables comes on line.

Hawkins has been an organizer in movements for peace, justice, labor, the environment, and independent politics since the late 1960s.  A former Marine, he helped organize opposition to the Vietnam War and was a leader in the anti-apartheid movement to end US corporate investment in the system of racist labor exploitation in South Africa . He was a co-founder of the anti-nuclear Clamshell Alliance in 1976 and the Green Party in the US in 1984.

Hawkins moved to Syracuse in 1991 to develop cooperatives for CommonWorks, a federation of cooperatives working for an economy that is cooperatively owned, democratically controlled, and ecologically sustainable. As a board member of the Southside Community Coalition, he is currently helping to develop a community- and worker-owned food cooperative in his inner city neighborhood where no grocery stores remain.

Hawkins currently unloads trailers at UPS, where he is a member of Teamsters Local 317 and active in Teamsters for a Democratic Union,  US Labor Against the War, and the Labor Campaign for Single Payer Healthcare.
Howie’s articles on politics, economics, and environmental issues have appeared in Against the Current, Green Politics, International Socialist Review, New Politics, Peace and Democracy News, Resist, Roll Call, Society and Nature, Z Magazine, and other publications. He is the editor of the 2006 book, Independent Politics: The Green Party Strategy Debate.

Hawkins will be seeking the Green Party nomination for Governor. Hawkins has previously been the Green Party nominee for US Senate and State Comptroller. The Green Party will hold its statewide nominating convention in Albany on Saturday May 15th at the Women’s Club, 725 Madison Ave .

The Green Party is committed to ecology, grassroots democracy, nonviolence, and social and economic justice. The Green Party has 22,939 enrolled voters in NYS, the sixth largest total. To regain its status as a ballot qualified party in NYS the Green Party’s nominee for Governor must obtain 50,000 votes. The Green Party successfully sued in federal court to allow individuals to enroll as official members for any party that qualifies a Gubernatorial candidate for the ballot. The Green Party is an official national party with the FEC.

Filed under: 3rd party, activism, election, Election 2010, elections, Environment, grassroots democracy, Green Party, News