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Indianapolis-- The Greater Indianapolis Fairness Alliance (GIFA) will outline their 2003 election strategy at an open meeting on Saturday, July 26 beginning at 10 AM at Jesus Metropolitan Community Church, 2950 East 55th Place. A brief overview of the 2003 strategy will be followed by specific action items planned for this year. These action items will culminate in a Voter's Guide for the fall City-County Council election. The action items provide a variety of opportunities for people to participate.

The group staffed a booth at the IN Pride gathering on June 14 and found great enthusiasm for the Voter's Guide and the possibility of the GLBT community organizing to become a viable and powerful political contingent in Indianapolis. The group registered voters and signed people up to receive the fall Voter's Guide.

Organizers of the meeting for July 26 are hopeful that people will find specific ways to become involved that match their interests. "In order to have the political clout that is possible, we are going to need people with all kinds of skills and different levels of time and involvement. We have many tasks that entail no meetings, just showing up and doing things, many one-time tasks, many do-at-home tasks, and of course, we'd also welcome people to be involved in the strategy sessions" says Tammara Tracy. Opportunities to help range from data entry, web/graphic design, and writing to legal/financial research, phone banking, and distributing materials to local businesses. Linda Perdue added, "We are even going to need people to throw parties!"

Although only a few months old, GIFA distributed a candidate survey and produced a preliminary Voter's Guide for the primary election, both of which can be viewed on the web at www.indyfairness.org . Throughout the summer GIFA volunteers will be contacting candidates in order to provide the GLBT community a complete Voter's Guide for all districts. The group is pushing hard on this year's election due to the potential to demonstrate the political strength of the GLBT vote. Since there are no national offices up for election, overall voter turn out is expected to be low and the number of votes needed to win may also be very low. Mark St. John contends, "If we can mobilize our community to vote and use the Voter's Guide, we can make a substantial difference in who is elected to the council and who is not."

Other strategies include targeting 4-5 districts and helping with nitty-gritty political jobs such as identifying voters in each district, holding meet-the-candidate opportunities, phone banking, and staffing polling places on election day to distribute information for the chosen candidate. The group will also continue to register voters throughout the summer and fall as part of their get-out-the-vote plan.

Some GIFA volunteers have already attended a National Gay & Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF) Power Summit in Cincinnati. "This group is about getting things done - we aren't messing around because we don't have time to waste!" indicated Mary Byrne. In explaining the urgency, Mary shared that as a GLBT baby boomer, she's become even more aware of the magnitude of her own 'second-class citizen status'. "It is amazing how short changed we are and most of us [GLBT people] aren't even aware - until it's too late." Examples of the disparity include: federal and state inheritance taxes being owed by a surviving domestic partner whose name is even on the title; job discrimination not based on performance; job benefits such as health insurance, some leave-time and childcare opportunities being denied to GLBT families; and retirement benefits (health insurance, life insurance, etc) denied to surviving partners.

The Greater Indianapolis Fairness Alliance (GIFA) is a local, non-partisan political organization working for fairness & equality for the GLBT community. GIFA evolved from last year's GLBT mobilization supporting the ordinance introduced in the City-County Council by Councilwoman Karen Horseman; the ordinance would have provided benefits to domestic partners of city employees. For more information or to help, phone 923-6566 or visit www.indyfairness.org.