Thursday, June 22, 2006

Volunteer efforts

These days I can't listen to my telephone messages without hearing an earnest young volunteer from Deval Patrick's gubernatorial campaign, inviting me hither or thither.

It all started this way.

``Hi, Scot. This is a message from the Deval Patrick campaign. We would like you to help us out by marching in the Boston Gay Pride Parade with Deval. If you or someone you know would like to march with us, please give Matt a call at.... ''

By the time I got the message, that particular parade was in the past, but the Patrick campaign wasn't daunted.
A short time later, there came this invitation.

``Hi Scot, my name is Brianna. I was just calling to invite you to march with us this Sunday at the Bunker Hill Day Parade. If you are interested, we are going to be meeting at 12 noon at the corner of Vine and Bunker Hill Streets. You can just look for someone in a Deval Patrick T-shirt or a person with a Deval Patrick sign.''

My next invitation was from Brian, who wanted not just a marching companion for Deval, but some actual work out of me. He called to let me know ``that Saturday morning we are doing some canvassing in Charlestown. Wondering if you might be around and might have the chance to distribute some literature with us, just get the word out about Deval? .... We'll probably start at 10. It will only be a couple of hours.''

A couple hours? Of work? On Saturday? Egad. If it weren't my work phone, I might just have had the line disconnected. Now, if the Patrick campaign really wanted to tempt me, the message would have to be along these lines: ``Hey, Scot, a bunch of us Patrick volunteers are getting together tonight at the 99 restaurant. Deval says the beers are on him, so please stop by when you get done work.''

Ah, no, just kidding, just kidding.

But the question is, why am I suddenly in such demand as a possible marching companion and canvasser? Well, it turns out it's because a few weeks ago, I entered my name, address, and phone number at Community.DevalPatrick.com so that campaign manager John Walsh could show me how Patrick's Internet organizing and outreach worked.

It's working pretty well, at least if my experience is any indication.
Since Patrick's big win at the Democratic Party Convention -- and since school got out -- volunteers have flooded the campaign, says spokesman Richard Chacon. And they are now using the information from the website to get the Internet community activated.

``You didn't know what you were getting into when you signed on,'' he jokes.

No I didn't -- but I'm here to report that the Patrick troops really are reaching out. And that they are nothing if not persistent.

Posted by at 05:21 PM

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