WHY: The Job Center opened in September 2020 and SETA is recommending defunding it. We CANNOT close its' doors. If ever there was ever a need for a Sacramento Job Center, it is NOW, especially coming out of the pandemic when more than ever the black and brown community is looking for work! Now more than ever we need a Job Center serving Oak Park and surrounding neighborhoods. Proposed Talking Points: 1. Oak Park is a critical community where a Job Center is needed. It is in the Promise Zone, Opportunity Zone, and designated an Enterprise Zone by HUD. 2. COVID 19 has significantly impacted Oak Park and has left many of its residents jobless and homeless. Having a Job Center in this area will be key to assisting residents find employment in order to provide for their families. Job Centers are designed to provide opportunities and resources to those most impacted by social determinants and racial equity. 3. The Fruitridge Career Center is part of a collective of non-profit organizations that work to develop the Oak Park community by reducing social and health disparities with children, adults and seniors. 4. SETA compared the performance of the newly established Fruitridge Career Center after seven (7) months of operation, during the pandemic, with the performance of Job Centers that have been open for decades, while acknowledging that even those centers under-performed because of the pandemic. 5. Pivot Sacramento as part of GoBiz operates an employment program that is consistent with the Job Center that targets people reentering from jail or prison. Through that program, we enrolled approximately 760 participants over 18 months, most enrolled during the pandemic. 6. The Fruitridge Career Center has developed relationships with employers and other community stakeholders, including the Black Child Legacy Campaign, CPS, DHA, Alchemist, River Oaks Resource Center, Unite Us and many others. 7. The Fruitridge Career Center partners with the Aggie Square Committee and Community Engagement Department at UC Davis to create employment opportunities for the Oak Park community. The termination of the Fruitridge Career Center will terminate those relationships. 8. SETA claims that funds are allocated to provide activities and services that assist unemployed and underemployed individuals to gain the skills necessary to enter high demand careers in the region. Closing the Fruitridge Career Center in Oak Park which has a high number of unemployed and underemployed individuals, especially as we near the end of the pandemic, contradicts those claims. We need you to SHOW UP and GET LOUD! MAKE A PUBLIC COMMENT ON JUNE 3RD (10AM): ~Make a verbal public comment during a meeting. The public comment phone line will open 15-minutes prior to the start of the meeting. ~Refer to the agenda and listen to the live meeting to determine when is the best time to call to be placed in queue to make a public comment (ITEM III-B – 3 – ACTION). ~Dial (916) 263-3827 and follow the prompts to be placed in queue for a specific agenda item (ITEM III-B – 3 – ACTION) on or off-agenda matter. Each agenda item queue will remain open until the public comment period is closed for that specific item.

Hillsborough community members with disabilities, weak immune systems, and others should be able to participate in our local government.

Kevin McCarthy and the GOP's silence in the face of Greene's unconscionable conduct isn't just a bad look—it's a threat to other lawmakers. Her recent comments glorifying the violent attack on our country on January 6, 2021, suggesting that she would have overthrown the government with armed insurrection, is inexcusable. Her previous threats against Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have caused AOC to fear for her physical safety and hire more security, and Rep. Jimmy Gomez, who introduced the resolution to expel Greene, reports receiving death threats from her supporters. Republican House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is failing in his duty to reprimand Greene for her heinous words and deeds. He was forced to remove her GOP committee assignments, but following the 2022 election, he's making deals with her and seems prepared to reward her bad behavior in order to consolidate his own power. Meanwhile, McCarthy ousted Rep. Liz Cheney from House GOP leadership for telling the truth and calling out Trump’s big lie that the election was stolen. This proves that Marjorie Taylor Greene is not an outlier in the Republican party. She is a perfect encapsulation of today’s GOP. Workplace safety is a growing concern across America. Hate can be lethal. There should be no tolerance for anyone who threatens colleagues. This goes for Congress as well – if not more so since members of Congress are supposed to be national leaders. The list of reasons why Rep. Greene should be expelled from Congress goes on and on, but here are a few: - She has repeatedly publicly supported calls to execute prominent Democratic politicians, including liking a Facebook comment that called for Nancy Pelosi to get "a bullet to the head." In other posts, Greene liked comments about executing FBI agents who were alleged to be part of the "deep state" working against Trump. - She’s endorsed conspiracy theories claiming that 9/11 was an inside job and that the Sandy Hook shooting--where 26 elementary school children and teachers were massacred—was staged. - She is Islamophobic and antisemitic and suggested the 2018 midterms—when our nation’s first two Muslim Congresswomen were elected—were part of “an Islamic invasion of our government,” and she thinks Jewish space lasers are responsible for a wildfire in California. - She was one of the many members of Congress who voted to object to the election results after the deadly, white supremacist attack on our Capitol and our democracy on January 6. - On January 12, after the insurrection and after results of the election had been certified by all 50 states, by the Electoral College, and by Congress, she tweeted, “President Trump will remain in office.” - She has repeatedly targeted, threatened, and harassed other members of Congress including Congresswomen Cori Bush and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. - Hundreds of posts, likes, and comments showing Rep. Greene inciting violence by spewing baseless conspiracy theories that have endangered the lives of many continue to resurface across the internet. And that’s just scratching the surface. Our country and democracy are in danger every minute that Rep. Greene is still a member of Congress. McCarthy can change this. This is why we must come together to make sure McCarthy expels Marjorie Taylor Greene from Congress, now.

I am a neurologist / neuroscientist. In 2016, the NFL acknowledged the link between football and chronic traumatic encephalopathy (1). They agreed to a total payout of up to $1B for thousands of lawsuits. They then proceeded to payout pennies on the dollar of what players and their families were owed (2). 60% of athletes in the NFL are Black. Most recently, this exploitation shamefully persists in the context of a performative $250M commitment over 10 years to combat systemic racism. For orientation, annual revenue during a pandemic (2020) was $12B. Tell NFL CEO Roger Stokoe Goodell to re-examine cases for every Black NFL former athlete without race-norming and increase payouts to meaningfully address the impact of neurological injuries sustained + delay in compensation. (1) https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/nfl-acknowledges-a-link-between-football-cte/ (2) https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nfl/2018/10/23/nfl-players-family-members-settlement/1736602002/ (3) https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/553482-nfl-accused-of-systemic-racism-in-handling-black-ex-players-brain

#MeToo has sparked an outpouring of personal stories of sexual harassment and assault. Over 81 percent of women in the United States report having experienced sexual harassment. The damage is physical, psychological, and economic. It can happen to anyone—including men. That’s why we have laws in place to keep employees safe in the workplace from being harassed or retaliated against if they speak up about it. The conversation needs to include those who witness or are otherwise aware of these illegal actions – they need to speak up and let their voice be heard. But in order to change the status quo, we need those who are witnesses to the harassment or assault — and most often encourage that behavior through their silence — to speak up and say “sexual harassment and retaliation is not okay.” Take the pledge to act, and share with everyone who you want to invite to join you in taking on sexual harassment and assault and demand Mayor Klinakis ensure the City of La Puente is a safe place to work. #Time'sUpMayorKlinakis #StopKlinakisAbuse

This was preventable. Facebook has willfully enabled anti-Muslim violence and genocide around the world—including Myanmar, India, Australia, Sri Lanka and more. Today, it's the Palestinians who are targeted. Will you sign this petition to Facebook right now and demand that they stop this violence from taking place. They have enabled so much death against vulnerable communities, it must stop.

For the first time, there is legislation in Congress to ensure that no US tax dollars fund multiple human rights violations carried out by the Israeli government against Palestinians. We need you to take action today to ensure that your representative is on this bill. The Palestinian Children and Families Act (H.R. 2590), introduced by Congresswoman Betty McCollum (D-MN), states that the U.S. will not fund the Israeli government's imprisonment and torture of Palestinian children; theft and destruction of Palestinian homes and property; or any further annexation of Palestinian land. This legislation couldn't come at a more critical moment. The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed systemic injustices across the globe, intensifying the harms of state violence and discrimination - Israel is no exception. During the pandemic, the Israeli government has continued to imprison Palestinian children under a military court system, putting them in grave danger of contracting COVID and separating them from their families. Horrifyingly, at a time when we are all asked to stay at home, the Israeli government has actually increased the rate at which it is demolishing Palestinian homes. Now is the time: The U.S. must stop funding the Israeli government's human rights abuses.

The Supreme Court just agreed to hear a case that could lead to Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett overturning Roe v. Wade. Mississippi recently banned abortion in the first 15 weeks of a pregnancy. All lower courts have said it is unconstitutional. But now right-wing justices Kavanaugh and Barrett are eager to rule on this critical case. Kavanaugh and Barrett want to use this case and ones like it to overturn Roe v Wade, the landmark decision that protected abortion rights across America. Democratic politicians have spent years warning voters that this could happen. But so far, those politicians haven't taken all the steps needed to protect Roe v. Wade. The most important thing they can do right now is to fix the Supreme Court by adding two more seats. We need Senators to stop wasting time. Will you sign the petition and urge Congress to expand the Supreme Court and save our basic rights?

Palestinians have lived under Israeli military occupation and apartheid for decades. And the U.S. government has forced U.S. taxpayers to give Israel tens of billions of dollars in military funding along the way. In its April 2021 report, Human Rights Watch stated that "Israeli authorities are committing the crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution ... based on an overarching Israeli government policy to maintain the domination by Jewish Israelis over Palestinians..." As documented in the Human Rights Watch report, Israeli apartheid and persecution includes: - "The suspension of basic civil rights to millions of Palestinians." - "Confiscation of more than a third of the land in the [Occupied Palestinian] West Bank." - "The forcible transfer of thousands of Palestinians out of their homes." Apartheid itself is defined by the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court as “Inhumane acts ... committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group or groups and committed with the intention of maintaining that regime.” The U.S. has long been a major funder of Israeli apartheid, forcing taxpayers in the U.S. to give billions of dollars to Israel's military. Meanwhile, the Israeli government uses its military to confiscate Palestinian land and enable the building of Jewish-only settlements. Palestinians who dare to oppose these policies are often arrested, imprisoned, tortured, or even killed by Israeli soldiers and police. What can be done? The Human Rights Watch report says, “The Israeli government should dismantle all forms of systematic domination and oppression that privilege Jewish Israelis and systematically repress Palestinians, and end the persecution of Palestinians.” It is time for the U.S. to stop funding Israel's crimes against humanity. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris must immediately end all U.S. funding for the Israeli military. Sources: 1. “Abusive Israeli Policies Constitute Crimes of Apartheid, Persecution,” Human Rights Watch, April 27, 2021. https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/04/27/abusive-israeli-policies-constitute-crimes-apartheid-persecution. 2. “A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution,” Report, Human Rights Watch, April 27, 2021, https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/27/threshold-crossed/israeli-authorities-and-crimes-apartheid-and-persecution. 3. “Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court,” Article 7 - 2(h); https://legal.un.org/icc/statute/romefra.htm. * The artwork above is by Shirien.Creates. You can see more of her beautiful work on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shirien.creates/

On Sunday, May 16, Senator Jon Ossoff led 29 Senators in calling for an immediate ceasefire in Israel & Palestine to prevent further killing of civilians. On Monday, May 17, the Washington Post reported that members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee [HFAC] had just learned that Biden had approved a new weapons deal with Israel, even though the deal had been notified to the committee as required by law on May 5. These are offensive weapons similar to those that Saudi Arabia has used to kill civilians in Yemen. In response, Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro and other HFAC members expressed concern about the weapons deal and the message it would send about the urgency of a ceasefire and urged that the weapons deal be delayed so Congress could review it. But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi & Majority Leader Steny Hoyer overruled them and insisted the weapons deal would go forward without Congressional review. Senators don't work for Nancy Pelosi & Steny Hoyer. If even one Democratic Senator would speak up about this, it would give House Democrats more courage to insist on reviewing the weapons deal before it goes forward. In addition, under the Arms Export Control Act, a single Senator can introduce can introduce a resolution of disapproval on the arms deal and force a floor vote, as Senators Murphy and Paul did on Saudi arms deals in September 2016 & June 2017 in opposition to unconstitutional U.S. participation in the Saudi war in Yemen. Urge Members of Congress, especially Senators Sanders & Warren, to speak up about this weapons deal, demand that it be delayed & reviewed, and introduce legislation to force a floor vote, by signing our petition. References: Sen. Ossoff leads 29 Senators to call for immediate ceasefire: https://www.ossoff.senate.gov/press-releases/sen-ossoff-leads-28-senators-urging-immediate-ceasefire-in-middle-east/ WaPo article on House Dem opposition in arms deal https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/05/17/power-up-biden-administration-approves-735-million-weapons-sale-israel-raising-red-flags-some-house-democrats/ Rep Castro's statement demanding delay and review: https://twitter.com/AlexWardVox/status/1394369401420488708 House Dems demanding delay & review overruled by Pelosi & Hoyer: https://twitter.com/AlexWardVox/status/1394680891088285699

The characterizations by Knotts and the GOP are designed to shut down important dialogue and run counter to free speech principles. Education systems must welcome diverse opinions.

Palestinian people have the right to live in peace and with dignity. They have the right to control their land and natural resources. They have the inalienable right to be free. We, everyone committed to justice, must commit ourselves to freedom for all: "Freedom is indivisible...." June Jordan