There are a number of reasons why remote access to meetings should be preserved. First, it allows more people to attend meetings. This method has been necessary and is overdue - to remove it is discriminatory. There are those who cannot physically attend meetings for myriad reasons. Lack of transportation, caregiving, illness, age, etc. can all keep folks from in-person attendance. Second, following CDC guidelines in the meeting room means that attendance will be limited and, therefore, that fewer folks will be able to participate. To have meetings with only physical attendance and a limited number of attendees diminishes the public's ability to participate in decisions that involve them. Neptune had a hybrid meeting style in place. Third, NJ is still a highly at-risk state in terms of Covid infections. As of 9 April 20, cases were up 20% from a month ago. Monmouth County has the fourth-highest number of new cases. The Covid Tracker at the NY Times, updated on 10 April 21, states, "Monmouth County is at an extremely high risk of exposure to Covid-19." With these facts in mind, the reality is that there are those who will neither be able nor choose to participate because of health concerns. To deny the public remote access to meetings is exceedingly undemocratic and, at this time, medically unsafe.

Dr. Birx shared on CNN that in her estimation only 100,000 people should have died from this virus. If things had been mitigated properly 100s of thousands of lives could have been saved. The American People deserved to know the truth during the pandemic and STILL deserve to know the truth now. He caused unneeded hardship, emotional toll, debt and death to people unnecessarily.

We all know that corporations give to both sides of the aisle. It's how they get legislation that's favorable to what they want to do in business. It's been like that for decades, and until we pass legislation to get rid of dark money, it will stay that way. But now Mitch McConnell says corporations must stay out of politics. Well, staying out of politics means no more corporate contributions to politicians then. Since Mitch doesn't want corporations sticking their noses in politics, Mitch has to give back ALL the money he has taken from them. After all, we wouldn't want him to get any more corrupted than he already is, right?

A state political party should be sent a very clear message that abusing government power to suppress votes will not be tolerated by businesses because supporting unethical state legislatures economically funds corrupt government and it will not and should not be tolerated. The legislatures and ELECTED representatives should be held responsible for driving businesses out of state. Businesses should only support states economically that support democracy not actively suppress it. Because that is what is truly at stake.

Body Cameras have been used in New York since 2017. Unfortunately, the truth is that less than 0.1% of police body camera video files are ever reviewed. There is simply too much data for a human to automatically review. However, this data contains valuable insights that can be used to generate police performance metrics. The technology exists for these files to be scanned and analyzed to make reviews and reports an efficient and effective process. Wearing body cameras alone is not enough to instill trust in law enforcement transparency. The audio data needs to be analyzed through natural language processing that can identify the areas police departments need to improve to build community approval levels.

The freedom to choose our leaders, and to speak up for what we believe in, is foundational to American democracy. Restricting someone’s vote, their right to assemble, or their right to speak is taking away their freedom. Voting, the right to assemble, and free speech should be accessible for all citizens, no matter where they live, the color of their skin, or how much money they make. To make every vote and voice count, we need a system that is free and fair to ensure that everyone’s voice is heard. Florida lawmakers are pursuing bills that are meant to remove voting rights and personal freedoms. We need Walt Disney World, Carnival Cruise Lines, Royal Caribbean Cruises, JM Family Enterprises, and Publix to come out publicly and denounce any attempts of voter suppression or removal of personal freedoms by the Florida legislature. Currently two bills are making their way thru the Florida legislature and both are dangerous to the personal freedoms and voting rights of Floridians. HB1 the Combating Public Disorder bill enacts heavy-handed punishments designed to curb free speech by criminalizing acts of dissent. This bill has one purpose only: to further embolden racism in Florida. SB90, is another voter suppression bill which, if passed, would disenfranchise Florida voters by removing ballot drop boxes and enacting additional burdensome vote-by-mail requirements. We are urging Walt Disney World, Carnival Cruise Lines, Royal Caribbean Cruises, JM Family Enterprises, and Publix to follow the lead of the Black Economical Alliance, and speak out on behalf of Floridians for their personal freedoms and voting rights. Several corporations like Delta, Coca-Cola, American Airlines, and Dell have all come out against similar bills in Georgia and Texas. As beneficiaries of a democracy, we need you Walt Disney World, Carnival Cruise Lines, Royal Caribbean Cruises, JM Family Enterprises, and Publix to do your civic duty and publicly denounce any attempts of voter suppression or removal of personal freedoms by the Florida legislature. Works Cited: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/31/business/voting-rights-georgia-corporations.html

See Facebook page "Water Angel-conservation" for more information Legislators must do the right thing now for Texans before this legislative session ends in May, or Texans will see more (like the first during winter Storm Uri) Texas Public Utility ordered supply overcharging for crisis racketeers through our electricity and water utility bills in both summer and winter weather extremes from now on. That would be bad for Texans and for business. https://www.statesman.com/story/news/2021/03/15/bill-filed-texas-senate-could-undo-billions-ercot-overcharges/4701598001/ This Austin American Statesman article is re SB 2142 and quotes the author about the bill's transfer of emergency energy price setting and reversal authority away from legislators to Energy Reliability Council of Texas ERCOT. Legislature needs to reverse that price increase order this session and also needs to leave the authority for reversal with our elected lawmakers not transfer that authority to  governor appointees like the ones who have just resigned and the ones like the former ENRON executives who have been appointees since the creation of ERCOT and  appointed by Governors Bush, Perry and Abbott.) language in SB 2142 for transferring that authority away from elected lawmakers needs to be cut. Listen to the phone call between a Texas Public Utility Commissioner and Wall Street investors: https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/wall-street-profited-off-texas-blackouts/ During the conversation the Wall Street investors are promised by the Texas Utility commissioner that he personally will do all he can to ensure our elected Texas Law-makers will enabled these investors to keep their windfall gained by overcharging the People of Texas. He assured the investors our law makers can and will set up similar payment and finance mechanisms to help utilities collect the money from rate payers by facilitating the energy utility payments to investors as they did for water utilities. In past years the legislators made the Texas Water Development Board a "bank" with loan conditions decided behind closed doors by a committee of our legislators with campaigns well endowed by Wall street investors so that more  public utilities in Texas will end up bought out for cheap and controlled by investors.   Our Texas leader on this phone call promised the investors would   have their  way and law makers will cause  more crisis profiteering for them during Texas extreme heat.  They  planned for this summer as they spoke of removing the "Cap Gap" and again overcharge up to $9,000 per MW hour for extreme emergency pricing for energy this summer. That could be in effect for months. People can only live 3 days without water and die even faster in extreme heat. Yikes!  During this phone call the "Brazos Problem" was discussed, the investors obviously are not form Texas. They pronounced Brazos like "brau-ZOS." Brazos Valley Electric Utility does not want to pass these charges to their rate payers and filed for bankruptcy. The Texas Public Utility Commissioner apologized for the Investors feeling insecure and assured them Texas law makers can fix that too. This phone helped define the new Texas law makers' word and newly proposed bill title: "Securitization" is a Wall Street term. When used this way in Texas laws it sets up unethical, questionable laws, bad for Texans and for business. It establishes our laws as for securing crisis racketeer markets. This phone call was frightening to me. After this telephone meeting was made public, Governor Abbott dismissed this sole Public Utility Commissioner. Likely the new Utility regulator will be someone who will better keep phone calls from the public. It was also interesting to hear how the governor times his utility commissioner appointments in mid summer to avoid the legislature approval process.  Listen to the  Brookings Institute March 2021 radio podcast "Dollars and Sense" https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/DollarAndSense_Transcript_The-Texas-fiasco-and-the-global-push-for-green-energy.pdf. The experts explain that the small areas of Texas (20%) not included in our large state controlled investor influenced grid did not experience as bad impacts as the part of the state with utilities on the ERCOT grid. Experts stated this might provide evidence our law makers have made extreme weather impacts worse for most Texans. This is the energy price hike order for up to  $9,000 per MW hour that must be reversed. PUC Public Utility Commission   Docket No.51617 Feb 16 2021 https://www.puc.texas.gov/51617WinterERCOTOrder.pdf The Texas laws included in this price hike order contain many conflicts and violations with laws protecting the public and our resources.  Also they betray our leaders' oaths of office.   A few laws they conflict with and violate include: Texas Administrative Procedure Act, the Public Utility Regulatory Act ('PURA'), Public Utility Commission rules, and due process rights.  These emergency pricing decisions are not reasonably supported by expert advice or evidence regarding either shortages or costs or protections for the public. Our leaders now are only considering market-based solutions.  However, market security does not equal security for the public,  our vital resources nor our national security. http://info.tpj.org/Lobby_Watch/pdf/ERCOTLW.fn.pdf https://www.newsweek.com/dallas-county-judge-says-gov-abbott-consciously-chose-regulations-that-led-power-crisis-1570289 https://us3.campaign-archive.com/?e=c78cc1abda&u=3d0ce87edeeb6df90043897db&id=daa51e0c30 https://www.texasmonthly.com/politics/texas-blackout-preventable/?utm_source=pocket-newtab

CPC's systematic use of scare tactics and misinformation will continue to jeopardize womens' safety if nothing is done. Sign this petition to preventing CPC's from receiving taxpayer funding. The state of Kansas currently uses YOUR tax dollars to fund CPC's that use lies and medical misinformation to keep women from obtaining safe abortion care. WHAT YOU CAN DO RIGHT NOW: - Sign this petition - Contact your representatives directly and urge them to make a stand about this issue - If you are aware that a clinic is fake, write an appeal to google to remove it from the search for "abortion clinics" and spread the word about it through social media or local signage - Share this petition on social media

The removal of the name J. Edgar Hoover from the Federal Bureau of Investigations building in Washington DC. Each and every FBI official employed past and present swore an oath to “defend the Constitution of the United States from all enemies, foreign and domestic”. It has been made clear throughout the years through declassified released FBI records and the Freedom of Information Act that under the leadership of J. Edgar Hoover have displayed the exact opposite of defending the US Constitution and have proven that Director Hoover was a “Domestic Enemy of the Constitution”. In this time of raising the concerns of social justice for Black people, the US government and election officials would look "performative" if THIS specific person is not shifted from his prominence in government based on the legacy of racism he instituted in the FBI policies and procedures. A few examples: -Hoover's first "Black Messiah" was Marcus Garvey. During that time, Marcus Garvey built an organization of Black people across the African diaspora in many countries to band together by educating each other in building wealth and political engagement. Garvey's UNIA organization also put together a still-relevant Black Agenda called the Declaration of the Negro Peoples of the World during the 1920 convention held at Madison Garden in from of 25,000 Black people. Hoover took down Garvey's operation by placing infiltrators including those specifically to discredit his movement. -Possible involvement of the unlawful assassination of Malcom X in 1965 -The threats on the life of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. through tapes sent to his wife and other tactics to suppress MLK's actions during the civil rights movement -Definite involvement of the assassination of Fred Hampton in 1969 -Refusal of active investigations in the murders of Cheney, Schwerner, and Goodman into hate crimes in Mississippi 1963 -Violating 1st amendment rights of people of color from WWI through the civil rights movements by unlawful surveillance tactics by the FBI -Harassment of Black celebrities such as Billie Holiday, Paul Roberson, and Langston Hughes -Doctored letters among Black organizations to start conflict including the result of a shoot out between the US Organization led by the founder of Kwanzaa Dr. Karenga and the California BPP which occurred strictly due to planted letters by the FBI found in 2007 -Intimidation of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and the efforts of Fannie Lou Hamer and Ella Baker to allow for segregation in voting to be discontinued. There are other examples. By removing J. Edgar Hoover’s name from the FBI HQ building, our nation can acknowledge the wrongs it has perpetuated due to his leadership. . Healing begins when we stop heralding racists who victimized and disenfranchised innocent freedom fighters resulting in disgrace and even death of Black leaders. This begins with the removal of J. Edgar Hoover's name to the building in an effort to dismantle an unfair legacy rooted in racism at the Bureau.

Despite being elected to move away from Trump policies of the past, despite a clear reckoning on our priorities in the wake of COVID, and despite the fact that budgets are moral documents, President Biden is likely to propose a $740 BILLION budget that would keep Pentagon spending at Trump-era levels. Disappointed doesn’t begin to cut it. We’re furious. A growing chorus in Congress is too. But while Congress, not the White House, is ultimately in control of the purse strings, progressive champions can’t stop this budget on their own. That’s why we need to turn the pressure up even higher, and remind everyone in Congress and the White House: We want our priorities put back in order and that means cutting the Pentagon budget.

In this era when congressmembers and state legislators war with each other over the quality and fairness in the administration of elections, one statement on which all sides can agree is that all elections should be free, equal and open. In fact, 30 state constitutions, including North Carolina, California, and South Carolina mandate that all elections should be free, with 18 of these states also stating that elections should be “equal” or “open” and 15 of these states mandating that no "civil or military power shall at any time interfere to prevent the free exercise of the right of suffrage". Sadly, despite being the birthplace and resting place of civil rights advocates past and present, from Martin Luther King Jr. to John Lewis, and despite having the youngest state constitution as of 1983, Georgia's state constitution does not yet provide for such a basic expectation that our right to free suffrage shall be free and shall not be intimidated or suppressed by civil or military force. We need an amendment to the Georgia State Constitution mandating free, equal and open elections so that voters have a constitutional standard by which we can judge the integrity of elections administration, redistricting and other aspects of elections law in the State of Georgia. References: https://www.ncsl.org/research/redistricting/free-equal-election-clauses-in-state-constitutions.aspx https://www.commoncause.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/FreeEqualOnePager-9.4.19.pdf http://hrlr.law.columbia.edu/hrlr/free-and-equal-elections-a-new-state-constitutionalism-for-partisan-gerrymandering/

Juneteenth celebrates the end of slavery in the United States. It is also known as Emancipation Day, Juneteenth Independence Day, and Black Independence Day. On June 19, 1865, Major General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, TX, and announced the end of the civil war and the end of slavery. Although the Emancipation Proclamation came 2½ years earlier on January 1, 1863, many slave owners continued to hold their slaves captive after the announcement, so Juneteenth became a symbolic date representing African American freedom. Juneteenth is not a federal holiday. Forty-five states and the District of Columbia recognize Juneteenth as a holiday or observance.