2003 RECALL ELECTION CANDIDATES REUNION

The 10th Anniversary meeting of the 2003 California Gubernatorial recall candidates at the State Capitol was fun. Some of us met for lunch beforehand at the River City Brewing Company for lunch (Daniel Watts, Jon Zellhoefer, Cheryl Bly-Chester, Darrin Scheidle, and Marc Valdez).

Then we were joined by a few more candidates - Leonard Padilla, Badi Badiozamani and Gerold Gorman - at the Capitol, along with family and friends and people touring the capitol wandering in. Mark had his book available for us and we all signed each other's copies. We also had a screening of Jayson Haedrich's documentary - which I think everyone enjoyed. There were at least a few shots of everyone at our reunion in the film and I was one of the featured candidates. Afterwards, we ate at Bento Box for dinner (Jon Zellhoefer, Cheryl Bly-Chester, Gerold Gorman, Darrin Scheidle, and myself). The conversation was lively and I enjoyed hearing about everyone's intervening 10 years.

Marc Valdez did a great job organizing the event. He will start a webpage ‘The California 135’, at Darrin’s suggestion.

The main take away we had 10-years ago that still holds today was that the Candidates Coalition managed to come together across all party lines to support each other and find common ground to work together. We didn't have to agree on the politics to agree to work together. We all agreed then and now that that particular element of cooperation has been sorely missing in government.

Attached is a reunion photo.  Standing: Darrin Scheidle, Daniel Watts, Marc Valdez, Cheryl Bly-Chester, Gerrold Gorman. Seated Leonard Pailla, Badi Badiozamani, Jon Zelllhoefer.