Joan Huffman's Victory Demonstrates Needs for HCRP Growth

Joan Huffman’s victory provides our party with a welcome tonic at the end of a painful year. We, again, congratulate Senator-elect Huffman and all the people who worked so hard on her campaign, including the volunteers who worked tirelessly during the runoff campaign throughout the 6-county district.

Unfortunately, the issue of “volunteers” returns us to a recurring criticism we have heard about the Harris County Republican Party this year: it provides little active support to campaigns like Huffman’s, and is unable to muster the volunteers necessary to even man a phone bank at the Richmond headquarters. On one day last week during early voting, while the party leadership was touting its organization of volunteers for the Huffman campaign on radio and in emails, a prospective volunteer told us that when he went to the Richmond office to volunteer to man a phone, only two staffers were present, and no one was making calls to get out the vote.

This report is consistent with the stories we have heard from volunteers and precinct chairs throughout the Harris County portion of SD17, who could not muster any support for their efforts from the party leadership in Harris County until the runoff campaign was almost over; and then, the support was lackluster at best. Thankfully, these local volunteers and precinct chairs, together with their counterparts in the other counties, filled the void left by the Harris County party leadership, and they got Joan Huffman over the finish line.

The experience of this runoff campaign proves the point we have been arguing for several weeks now. To remain competitive in Harris County elections in the upcoming election cycles in 2009 and 2010, we need more than cheerful pep talks from our leadership—we need a strategic plan and aggressive action from the party leadership in this county, and we need it now.