Many scientific studies have linked noise exposure to direct and cumulative detrimental physical and mental health effects that include, but are not limited to, hearing loss, cardiovascular disease, reduced productivity, negative social behavior, sleep deprivation, annoyance reactions, and increases the frequency of antisocial behavior. Nuisance noise adversely affects health and well-being in the same way as chronic stress (H. A. R. Jensen, B. Rasmussen, and O. Ekholm, “Neighbour noise annoyance is associated with various mental and physical health symptoms: results from a nationwide study among individuals living in multi-storey housing,” BMC Public Health, vol. 19, no. 1, p. 1508, Nov. 2019, doi: 10.1186/s12889-019-7893-8. [Online]. Available: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-019-7893-8. )

For decades, California has underfunded mental health services. As a result, the criminal justice system often serves as the state’s default mental health provider, with jails and prisons filled with people suffering from mental illness. In addition, an estimated 10% of law enforcement agencies’ budgets – and 20% of staff time – are spent responding to individuals with mental illness. A direct consequence of our overreliance on law enforcement responses to mental health crises is that almost a quarter of all people killed in police-involved shootings since 2015 had a known mental illness, with black men dying at a disproportionate rate. Between when Derek Chauvin’s trial started and his conviction for the murder of George Floyd, 64 people died at the hands of police. More than a dozen of them had a known mental illness or were in the throes of a mental health crisis. In 2019, Miles Hall, a 23-year-old black man living in Walnut Creek, was in the midst of a schizophrenic mental health crisis when his family called 911 for help. Despite being familiar with Miles’ condition, the officers resorted to lethal force within a minute of their arrival. Law enforcement officers are not mental health experts and should not be expected to serve this role. A better system for Miles and all Californians is possible – one that leads with treatment, not law enforcement. Last year, the federal government established “988” as the new 3-digit alternative to 911 for mental health crises. Callers to 988 will be connected with around-the-clock support, including mobile crisis teams that can respond to the scene with trained mental health professionals and peers rather than law enforcement. If California does not act now, the state will lose critical federal support and funding. Please urge California lawmakers to pass, and Governor Gavin Newsom to sign, Assembly Bill 988 (Bauer-Kahan) – also known as the Miles Hall Lifeline Act – to implement the 988 system in California and take concrete steps to reduce shootings where mental health is involved. AB 988 will ensure that we respond to a health crisis with a health response.

More shortages and price gouging are planned for this summer for Texans on the ERCOT state utility grid.   The extreme $9,000 (per megawatt hour) price hike energy law will continue to be applied. That law  was created during past legislation.   The Texas Public Utility Commission (PUC) order used it for the first time during Winter Storm Uri.  This petition's requested legislation is vitally and urgently needed and must be passed before the end of this legislative session to reverse the price hike order and to nullify the bad energy laws it cited. These conflict with and violate other laws including: 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. This moment in history is a tipping point for Texans.  If this happens Texans can regain control over pricing and management of our public utilities.   If this does not happen, the first time emergency price hike order will be approved by default (legislative inaction)  and the first time payout to investors will initiate federal commodification protections for  investor rights and creation of a new Wall Street hedge fund "Suppliers of ERCOT During Shortages"  market which will include investor-owned suppliers of both water and energy to our state  ERCOT utilities. Also NOAA long term forecasts predict very extreme heat and drought in the future starting this summer and extends these severe predictions over the next year.  https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/predictions/long_range/two_class.php Regarding both energy and water utilities: shortages in one lead to shortages in the other, and price gouging in both.  See Facebook Site "Water Angel - conservation"  to learn how the emergency extreme energy price gouging happened during Winter Storm Uri and how the legislature and governor-appointed energy boards have been responding since the storm ended.   Not  all of this has been reported at once for YOU to see the BIG Picture until posted on FB site "Water Angel - conservation."

Child care facilities remain on the brink of closure! Please tell Colorado to give their child care facilities the funds Congress allocated for them. Please ask the US Department of Health and Human Services Office of Child Care to provide better oversight of these funds. Please ask the General Accountability Office to investigate misappropriation of these public funds.

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?

In 2017, the government of Michigan signed into law a number of exemptions regarding the disclosure of body camera recordings by public-records request. 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.

In February of 2020 the governor of Wisconsin, Tony Evers, signed a law regulating police body cameras. The legislation did not require law enforcement agencies to use body cameras, rather it created regulations for the ones that do use them. The law requires departments to keep body cam footage for at least 120 days or longer if an investigation is ongoing. 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.

Body camera footage that is not classified as active or inactive criminal investigative data must be retained for at least 90 days according to Minnesota statutes. 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.

In 2019, former Ohio Governor John Kasich signed into law an extensive amendment to Ohio’s existing public records act which includes the mandate that made most police body-worn camera footage is generally subject to public disclosure 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.

Body Camera footage is exempt from Pennsylvania's Right-to-Know law. 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.