The Green Party of California (GPCA) is the California affiliate of the Green Party of the United States. The party is a ballot-qualified in California, first established as such in 1991, using the petition method of gaining state recognition.
As of May 2012, there were 110,724 registered party members accounting for 0.65 percent of registered voters in California, a drop from seven years prior, when the party had 158,000 members, for 0.95 percent of registered voters. Mendocino, Santa Cruz, and Humboldt County have the highest per-capita number of Green Party members.
To maintain qualified status in California, a party must have registered voters equal to or more than 1 percent of the number of votes cast in the previous gubernatorial election, or by the statewide race method, according to which a party may retain its ballot status by receiving at least 2 percent in any of seven statewide races.
In 1994 Margaret Garcia received 3.8 percent (315,079 votes) for Secretary of State, surpassing the 2 percent threshold necessary to retain statewide ballot status. Garcia's total retained ballot status for the Green Party of California, because after the November 1994 election, the number of voters needed to qualify (or re-qualify) went up to 89,007 (Green registrants stood at 78,992). Had Garcia not received the total she did, the Green Party of California would have lost its ballot status as of January 1995.
Since the 1994 elections, the party has had continuous ballot access in California.
In 1996 Arcata, California, a city with a population of about 17,000, became the first city ever to have a Green majority on the city council, with three of five seats. Greens controlled the council from 1996–1998 and again from 2004-2006.
In November 2009, Fairfax, California gained a Green majority in city council, winning three out of five seats. And as of December 2009, at least 33 Green Party of California members hold elected office, including Mayor of Richmond (Richmond Greens), Gayle McLaughlin, Mayor of Sebastopol, Larry Robinson, Mayor of Marina, Bruce Delgado and Mayor of Fairfax, Lew Tremaine.
Famous quotes containing the words green, party and/or california:
“The question of whether it’s God’s green earth is not at center stage, except in the sense that if so, one is reminded with some regularity that He may be dying.”
—Edward Hoagland (b. 1932)
“DORIS: Here’s the two of spades.
DUSTY: The two of spades!
THAT’S THE COFFIN!!
DORIS: THAT’S THE COFFIN?
Oh good heavens what’ll I do?
Just before a party too!”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)
“I can’t earn my own living. I could never make anything turn into money. It’s like making fires. A careful assortment of paper, shavings, faggots and kindling nicely tipped with pitch will never light for me. I have never been present when a cigarette butt, extinct, thrown into a damp and isolated spot, started a conflagration in the California woods.”
—Margaret Anderson (1886–1973)