43rd District Democrats of Washington

Dear members of the 43rd District Democrats,

It has been my honor to serve as your Vice-Chair for Technology for the past 18 months. I've enjoyed working closely with the rest of the Executive Board to serve you in moving our Democratic values forward in Seattle. From our monthly meetings, to engaging conversations with candidates running for public office, to our fundraising events, and more - it has truly been an incredible experience. On December 31, 2011, I will be resigning from the Executive Board and am looking forward to helping assist the district in finding a candidate for the role of Vice-Chair for Technology. Below is an Officer Description that includes the district's immediate needs and also regular officer duties. You can also download the officer description [PDF].

This opportunity has been amazing and I've learned a ton about the political process, including the pragmatic Robert's Rules of Order! Again, thank you for letting me serve you for the last 18 months as Vice-Chair for Technology. See you all at our holiday party on December 13th.

Regards,
Carrie Zanger
Outgoing Vice-Chair for Technology

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District Officer Description: Vice-Chair for Technology

Immediate Needs:
The 43rd District Democrats need a Vice-Chair for Technology who can manage a Drupal-based website, keeping the site up to date with new releases and patches from Drupal, and helping us maintain the site's content. The Vice-Chair for Communications and other officers will supply the actual content. Our Vice-Chair for Technology also needs the ability to manage small mailing lists and email aliases, using our site's CPanel, which is provided by DreamHost.

Ideally, we'd like someone who can improve the 43rd's membership database. We're currently using a Google Docs spreadsheet, and would like to upgrade to a "real" database - our departing Vice-Chair for Technology has set up a database using the Drupal CiviCRM module, and our goal is to migrate to a new database in time for organizing the 2012 elections. We expect a new volunteer may have new ideas and tools for how to do this.

Technical Skills:

• You should know what "Drupal" is, and ideally have some experience with it. If you know other open-source systems like WordPress, you can probably pick up Drupal without much difficulty. "CPanel" should also ring a bell.
• Skills in MySQL, PHP, and JavaScript may also come in handy, but aren't needed on a regular basis.

Duties of the role:

• Attend bi-weekly meetings
  • General public membership meetings (Third Tuesday of every month)
  • Executive Board meetings (First Tuesday of every month)
• Manage email aliases for the 43rd's officers through DreamHost's CPanel.
• Manage Google Groups mailing lists by adding/editing new board members when needed
• Work in tandem with the Vice Chair for Communications to:
  • Monitor social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, Flickr)
  • Post news and monthly meeting minutes as needed
  • Export monthly eNewsletter signups from website
• Filter inquiries that come through the website for volunteers and general community questions
• Work in tandem with the Vice Chair for Events to create bi-annual tickets for the Summer BBQ and Winter holiday parties (PayPal, Brown Paper Tickets, etc)

To inquire about the Vice-Chair for Technology position with the 43rd District Democrats, please email tech@43rddems.org.