User talk:Gayle McLaughlin

Deleted info
Just curious why you would want to delete this sourced information? The New York Times article from 2012 says plainly "In its continuing fight, Chevron has again spent $1.2 million, this time to oppose two City Council candidates who are critical of the company and to support three who are considered supportive." So what's wrong? SteveStrummer (talk) 00:02, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

Unfortunately, that was the one year our RPA candidates did not win. So when it stated "their candidacies mostly lost" [which I assumed to mean Chevron's candidates] it wasn't accurate. I'll put something back in that does reference that Chevron did spend 1.2 million to oppose our two candidates and support three of their own candidates. Gayle McLaughlin (talk) 03:18, 18 May 2017 (UTC)

There is currently a discussion at Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved.

May 2017
This account has been blocked indefinitely from editing Wikipedia because the username, Gayle McLaughlin, matches the name of a well-known, living person.

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Gayle McLaughlin
I'm sorry to see that you've been blocked by an admin, and I would like to try to help you. I have no way of knowing if you're the real Gayle McLaughlin or just a supporter but clearly we both want to improve the article. I wrote about 90% of its current form, so if you're unhappy, I'm unhappy. Please contact me here or on my own user talkpage if I can be of assistance in any way. SteveStrummer (talk) 01:36, 24 May 2017 (UTC)

Dear Steve, Thank you for being willing to assist and thank you for writing about 90% of the article! I appreciate your writing this article and having this conversation with me. I also appreciate your past edits, questions and explanations. I am the real Gayle McLaughlin. Some current edits I've been trying to make are these: 1. I am no longer a Green Party member. I am registered NPP (No Party Preference). To check this out, please go to the Contra Costa (my county) registration look-up page https://www.cocovote.us/voter-registration/voter-registration-lookup/#VoterLookupandSampleBallotSearch  Insert my first name Gayle ;  my last name Mc Laughlin (you have to have a space between the c and the L) and my birth date 05/02/1952  and then scroll down to see my political preference as None. In California, we call this registration category NPP (No Party Preference). So I was wanting the text in the article to say "Formerly a member of the Green Party...." in the second sentence of the first paragraph. Also I wanted to change the designation under the photo to say, Political Party: NPP (No Party Preference) 2. I prefer being called an "elected official from California" rather than an " American politician from California" but that is less important to me. 3. I was not a Green Party "official" while I was mayor, but I was a Green Party member. I tried to change the word "official" to "member" which I'd like changed for accuracy. 4. I tried to change the photo. I uploaded the photo I'd like used to wikimedia. It's the photo that is used frequently to publicize speeches and presentations that I deliver at different events. It is in the public domain. 5. Also can you remove that box at the top of the page that starts off by saying: "A major contributor to this article appears to have a close connection with its subject."

Those are the main things for now that I need help on. I would really appreciate your help and also would appreciate your advice on how to get me "unblocked." I may need to make more "updates" in the very near future based on some new plans and would like to be able to update as needed. If this is not possible, perhaps I can go through you.

Many, many thanks, Steve. With great appreciation, Gayle McLaughlin former Richmond Mayor and current Councilmember Gayle McLaughlin (talk) 13:57, 24 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Hi, Gayle. I'm trying to work on some of those issues you mentioned. Based on your contributions here, I already believe that you are the real Gayle McLaughlin, but I would recommend that you verify your identity through the method described above. It is annoying, no doubt, but it's a process intended to protect famous names from impersonation. Doing so will permit an admin to unblock you. (I'll help argue your case if necessary, but I don't think it will be.) Then you'll be free to edit articles, and upload your photos with validity. Be aware, though, that you mustn't make any edits to articles that concern yourself: this is a firm policy described most succinctly at Plain and simple conflict of interest guide. Don't be discouraged by this! What you'll do in such cases is just write your desired edits on the article talkpage (or the talkpage of an interested editor), and include a source if needed. I can virtually guarantee that any such requests will be considered promptly by some watchful editor and, if framed properly and without puffery, they'll be readily implemented. I hope you'll let me know what you choose to do. SteveStrummer (talk) 21:01, 24 May 2017 (UTC)

requesting two edits to my wiki page to reflect my current voter registration
Hello,

I very much appreciate that an administrator has verified that I am the real Gayle McLaughlin and requested that I be unblocked.

I now have a couple of edits that I hope someone will insert/modify in the article. The edits are as below:

1. I have changed my party affiliation from Green Party to NPP (No Party Preference), which is a voter registration category in the state of California. Since I am no longer a member of the Green Party, please change the second sentence of the article to say this: A former member of the Green Party of California, she was first elected to the City Council of Richmond, California in 2004.

2. Also, under my photo where it says Political Party, it should no longer say Green Party of the United States, but should say:  No Party Preference - NPP

I am hopeful someone can make these corrections for me.

Very sincerely, Gayle McLaughlin Gayle McLaughlin (talk) 03:52, 30 May 2017 (UTC)


 * Hi Gayle, I'm very glad you got your account verified! I'm more than happy to help you with any editing. In this particular instance, though, I wonder if using your voter registration lookup is the right thing to do. It might be removed as original research; much more importantly, I'd be concerned that the lookup displays your home address. Are you sure you want that? I think it would be better to use a secondary source: hasn't your party switch ever been reported in a news article or a website? SteveStrummer (talk) 01:20, 1 June 2017 (UTC)

Good point, Steve, about my voter registration. Here is an article that talks about my NPP registration. See the last two paragraphs of the article. http://www.beyondchron.org/corporate-free-richmond-candidates-moving/  Thanks for any help you can provide. Gayle McLaughlin (talk) 02:38, 2 June 2017 (UTC)

Editing Wikipedia
Hi Gayle, it's looking like I might not be around much longer, so I want to leave some advice for you. It looks like will be checking Wikipedia less frequently from now on. If you wish to contact me for anything, please do so at my own talkpage, User talk:SteveStrummer, so I'll get a notification that a new message is waiting. Thanks, and all the best to you in the future. SteveStrummer (talk) 01:10, 7 June 2017 (UTC)
 * You can't directly edit the Gayle McLaughlin article but you can make requests for edits on the talkpage, Talk:Gayle McLaughlin.
 * Other articles that you should probably not edit (but which you should certainly be monitoring) include Richmond City Council (Richmond, California), 2006 Richmond, California city election, Richmond, California municipal elections, 2014, Richmond Progressive Alliance, Chevron Corporation, Chevron Richmond Refinery, and of course Richmond, California.
 * You can freely upload any photos to Wikimedia Commons. If they're photos of yourself, put them in Category:Gayle McLaughlin.
 * Don't place your pictures in public domain. Always use the CC4 license ("Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International").
 * Lastly let me apologize for making a paper-thin biography of you when you deserve much more. I started working on it in March, just a day after it had been aggressively nominated for deletion. I didn't do a fantastic job, but at least it survived. I hope it will continue to grow and improve.