Tea and politics

By Dawn Wolfe Gutterman

LIVONIA – Because the interview is taking place over tea, Derek Smiertka begins by talking about tea. In under 10 minutes, he has explained how monkeys are used in China to harvest tea from hard-to-reach places, discussed the various types of teas and the best places to get them, and talked about the white teas his former business partner brought back from trips to China's Fujian province.
And tea is just a hobby for Smiertka. Start talking about politics and he becomes really excited.
Now Smiertka is taking his passion, and more than 15 years of hard-core political experience, to his new job as executive director of Michigan Equality, which he began on Oct. 2.
Smiertka's political experience began "at the ripe age of 15 or 16" when he became a project coordinator for the Oakland County Republican party. Since then he has run campaigns, waged what became a losing campaign against the party's "God squad," and co-founded a lobbying firm.
Smiertka became a Republican because the GOP was his parent's party. In addition, "I just got really hooked into the whole political idea that these people can actually get something done. Ironic, considering my views today."
At 18, Smiertka ran his first campaign, for Gary Woronchak for state representative in Dearborn.
"I still have a lot of fond memories of that campaign and of him. He cared about real issues," Smiertka said.
By the time he was about 21, Smiertka was the party's political director in Oakland County. In a way, Smiertka said, he and anti-gay crusader Tom McMillin "grew up" together in the party. And as McMillan-leaning conservatives gained influence, Smiertka lost his love for the party of his youth.
The Republican Party, "is not the party of intelligent thought – it's turned into the party of 'intelligent design,' Smiertka said, "of zealots and right-wingers that really only care about their success and not about the success of the country or of their constituents."
After spending 2002 working for L. Brooks Patterson and working for State Senator Shirley Johnson's, R-Royal Oak, re-election campaign, Smiertka co-founded the lobbying firm Advocacy Specialists. Among other issues, Smiertka and business partner Mike Kowall, who is also White Lake Township's supervisor, lobbied to change laws to get subcontractors paid for their work.
"It was great for a period of time," Smiertka said, "I got to pick and choose clients."
After four years, though, he found his DQ – his "desire quotient" waning.
As a lobbyist, "when it comes down to it you're being hired for somebody else's interests," Smiertka said. "It was not totally me."
After hearing about the Michigan Equality job and doing extensive research on the organization, Smiertka applied and was hired.
He has literally hit the ground running, too. In addition to spearheading efforts to pass Ferndale's human rights ordinance, Smiertka has short-term goals for Michigan Equality that include helping to re-elect Governor Granholm, elect Amos Williams as attorney general, and help elect or re-elect candidates in "about fourteen other state house and state senate races."
Future goals include working to pass Michigan's proposed anti-bullying legislation, second-parent adoption, and the repeal of 2004's Proposal 2, which banned marriage rights for same-sex couples.
"There's something like 1,500 rights that a married couple gets automatically. Do we have to fight for each one of those separately? I'll be on the street tomorrow fighting for them, one by one, if that's what it takes," he said.
It's a big job, and Smiertka has big goals, but leaders from Michigan Equality's President, Doug Meeks, to Senator Shirley Johnson think he's the man to make it all work.
"He has ties on both sides of the aisle, which makes us even more non-partisan in moving forward in making sure that equality in Michigan is achieved. It won't be one party or another – it'll be changing the hearts and minds of Michigan citizens, and that includes the legislature," said Meeks, while Johnson called Smiertka, "the best guy on the planet."
"I think it's a great fit," said Craig Covey, CEO of Midwest AIDS Prevention Project and Ferndale City Council member. Smiertka has served on the MAPP board for about five years. "Derek is a gold mine of information and knowledge about the political process including grassroots organizing and running campaigns. I look at him as a budding young activist who will be able to take the place of some of us older folks as we move on."

About Derek Smiertka

Age: 31

Education: Bachelor's Degree, Political Science, Oakland University

Career highlights:
* Co-founder of lobbying firm Advocacy Specialists
* Re-election campaign of Senator Shirley Johnson, R-Royal Oak
* Political executive director for former Oakland Party Republican Chair L. Brooks Patterson
* Development director for former state House Majority Leader Andrew Raczkowski