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ere’s what’s at the top of
my New Year’s wish list:
that three wise lesbians -
will run for the Vermont legislature
in 2004. e . ’ ‘ .
Ed Flanagan has finally set
his sights on a goal he can attain: a
seat in the Vermont Senate. That’s
good news, anda groundbreaker
for Vermont — if elected, he will be
the first openly gay state senator in
our history. And he will expand the
gay legislative caucus to three
members, building on the base
established by Reps. Bill Lippert
and Robert Dostis. There’s_report-
edly a gay man from Burlington 0
considering a run for the "House,
potentially raising the gay caucus
count to four. ' -

I say “gay” caucus with
purpose: there are no out lesbians
in the state legislature, no out trans
or bi folk, either. Not yet. The gay
and lesbian political activists I’ve
talked to are perplexed about why
it’s so hard to get women .— les-
bians — to run for the legislature.

, Is itthat we’re still recuper-
ating from the backlash trauma of
the campaigns of 2000 and 2002,
when a lot of us stuck our necks
out politically? _

One lesbian I know had
planned to run in 2000, but said
she has no plans to run, now —
despite a decade of local charitable
and political participation. She and
her partner were interviewed in The
New York Times and featured on
the front page of the Barre-
Montpelier Times Argus during the
civil unions debate. Afterward,
even people who knew her fairly
well began to doubt her worth as a
human being because they now 1

Democracy Begins at

knew without doubt that she’s a
lesbian. “There’s sort of knowing
and there’s really knowing,” the '
activist remembered her post-
mistress saying to her.

“I won’t run because I’m a-
practical person and I don’t want to
get the shit kicked out of mefor no
particular reason,” she says.
Perhaps, she muses, women take
campaign criticism more personally
than men do. '

Is it that we think our agen-
da is over with, done, accom-
plished? That our allies will always
vote in our interests? That there
aren’t plenty of non-lgbt-specific '
issues that need our attention: ade-
quate funding for schools, a real
and functioning safe schools pro- ‘
gram, making sure the air we
breathe isn’t full of toxic fumes,
funding healthcare and prescrip-
tions, and making medical marijua-
na legal for those who need it?

. Increasing numbers of us
have kids who need well-funded
schools that are safe for them to
learn in. All of us breathe and need
clean water to drink. Nearly all of
us have — or soon will have 4
health issues. ‘

Is it that it’s essentially a
seasonal job that doesn’t pay much,
and there are few lesbians who can
afford to take the time off from
their -regular jobs, or whose
employers will allow it?

That might be a big chunk
of the answer. Women still make
73 cents for every dollarimen earn.

Is it that lesbians with fami-
lies make a larger (more equitable)
contribution to the care of children
than most (straight) men with fami-
lies do, and serving in the legisla-

ture makes a bigger hole in their

lives? ‘
Perhaps part of the answer

to how we can help may lie in a

Massachusetts. A group of women
there formed an organization origi-
nally called “Enough.” They were

disgusted by the actions of the city
council, which had been exclusive-
ly populated by men for some

H years, and decided to do something

concrete to change it. Renaming
themselves “Women Helping

I Empower Neighborhoods” or

WHEN (as in “If not now ...”),
they promised to provide support

services for women candidates dur-'” "

ing the campaign: child care, car-
pooling, kid transport, and
casseroles, as well as more tradi-
tional campaign activities, like lit-
erature drops, fundraising, and let-
ter writing.

The three candidates
endorsed and supported by WHEN '
won their races in an election that
ousted all five of the incumbents
facing opposition on the seven-seat
city council. And WHEN has '
promised to continue their support
services while the winning candi-
dates are serving their terms.

We can do this, too — after
all, lesbians practically invented
the support group. It’s really a
question of whether we believe
state legislators have an impact on
our lives, and whether we can have
an impact on legislation by electing
more of “us.” I believe we can
have an impact — and that we can
mobilize to support lesbian candi-
dates. ~

Euan Bear

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