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Sac Food Coop Owners Rebuke BDS Efforts, Lawsuit Dismissed
Coop owners reject BDS candidates, pass ballot measures opposed by BDS
In a record turnout of more than 2000 owners, Sacramento Natural Foods Co-op Board members Ann Richardson and Alicia Dienst were overwhelmingly re-elected, and two Board-backed ballot measures also won lopsided victories in a hotly-contested election where a proposed boycott of Israeli products was a major issue. The two board candidates elected had strongly opposed the boycott, proposed by the Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) group of Sacramento.
Richardson received 1,338 votes and Dienst snared 1,328 ballots, far outpacing BDS-backed candidates Susan Bush (442) and Cody Potter (424). A fifth candidate, Phyllis Ehlert, received 251 votes.
Measure 2, which bans the Co-op from discriminating in its practices based on political opinion or the national origin of products, was approved by an 83.3-16.7 percent margin.
Measure 1, a technical bylaw change that will allow the Co-op to offer preferred shares, also won, approved by a 76-24 percent margin.
Both measures were supported by the Board of Directors and opposed by BDS.
The vote signals clear support for the Board's position to focus on the store's mission of providing natural foods, supporting local growers, encouraging the development of the cooperative movement, and community education.
On Friday, the Sacramento Superior Court dismissed a lawsuit against the Board by two BDS members.
The official results will be posted on the store's website, http://www.sacfoodcoop.com and in the store near the customer service desk.
Richardson received 1,338 votes and Dienst snared 1,328 ballots, far outpacing BDS-backed candidates Susan Bush (442) and Cody Potter (424). A fifth candidate, Phyllis Ehlert, received 251 votes.
Measure 2, which bans the Co-op from discriminating in its practices based on political opinion or the national origin of products, was approved by an 83.3-16.7 percent margin.
Measure 1, a technical bylaw change that will allow the Co-op to offer preferred shares, also won, approved by a 76-24 percent margin.
Both measures were supported by the Board of Directors and opposed by BDS.
The vote signals clear support for the Board's position to focus on the store's mission of providing natural foods, supporting local growers, encouraging the development of the cooperative movement, and community education.
On Friday, the Sacramento Superior Court dismissed a lawsuit against the Board by two BDS members.
The official results will be posted on the store's website, http://www.sacfoodcoop.com and in the store near the customer service desk.
For more information:
http://www.sacfoodcoop.com
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It's not a question of "getting politics out of the Co-op," but of understanding that social and ethical concerns are important, while also a source of potential conflict if we don't show mutual respect and solidarity as well as a taste for diversity.
What "political nonpartisanship" in the best sense of the Cooperative tradition does imply is a recognition that either to adopt an official boycott of Israeli products which many members strenuously oppose, or to try banishing the Israel/Palestine question from the sphere of respectable dialogue at the Co-op, will divide the Co-op and hurt the solidarity of our community. The policy of shelf labels, a Consumer Information Binder with the facts on the disputed products and materials reflecting many community viewpoints, and educational events and listening circles, is a way to respect all sides and restore a degree of peace at the Co-op.
Such a policy would mean that the exile of Maggie Coulter and any other activists banished from Co-op property for nonviolent advocacy activities -- allegedly a bit overzealous at times -- would end.
Such a policy would mean that open tabling at the Co-op, on Israel/Palestine issues or others, would be restored, with the Board taking a truly "politically neutral" stance and impartially facilitating the tradition of free speech so central both to the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley in 1964 and to the Co-op's history since its founding in 1973.
Such a policy would mean that BDS supporters would be welcomed as Co-op members and shoppers rather than targeted with a McCarthyist rhetoric about subversion from the "outside."
Such a policy would mean that the Board would acknowledge that the result on its Measure 2, an "antidiscrimination" (read anti-boycott) Bylaws amendment passed without any legitimate ballot argument in opposition, cannot be regarded as definitive. Of course, the standard anti-discrimination provisions of this measure are actually mandated by California state law and enjoy overwhelming support by people on all sides of the BDS issue, so it is overreaching interpretations by the Board that are the main concern.
Adopting a policy of peace, consumer information and education on disputed products (from Israel/Palestine, China, or elsewhere), and mutual tolerance will help to avoid the kind of polarization which contributed to the sad downfall of the Berkeley Co-op.
the sooner that people in Sacramento understand this, the better