The problem is that wild animals in circuses are not getting treated well. An example, according to Reuters, is in 2011 the U.S. Department of Agriculture fined the Ringling Bros—one of the biggest circuses in the country—for mistreating the wild animals in their circus acts. It was the biggest fine ever under the Animal Welfare Act (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usda-ringling-idUSTRE7AS2AG20111129/). And this is just one example of many. According to PETA, circus people make animals do tricks by hurting them with: whips, tight collars, muzzles, electric prods, bull hooks and other hurtful tools (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usda-ringling-idUSTRE7AS2AG20111129/). Also, according to PETA, when circuses people are traveling with wild animals, they sometimes don’t get enough food or water, they also are squeezed into small spaces and chained. They also rarely get their cages cleaned so they can get really sick. There are also lots of other circus tricks that don’t include animals. People watching circus tricks are still amazed without animals. According to Animal Legal and Historical Center, the biggest threat to wild animals in a circus is being mistreated by the people who work there (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usda-ringling-idUSTRE7AS2AG20111129/). There are six states that have banned wild animals in circuses. They are: California, Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, and New York (https://www.cga.ct.gov/2022/rpt/pdf/2022-R-0026.pdf). Why is Washington not one of the states that has banned wild animals in circuses? We are asking your support to ban wild animals in circuses in Washington State.

Please come and voice your concerns and opinions. YOUR neighborhood needs YOUR help! Emergency meeting is Monday March 4th. 6pm at Hope High School Auditorium

From jaw-dropping fight scenes to thrilling car chases, stunts take incredible creativity and skill to pull off safely. Action designers deserve to be honored as the artists and professionals they are. Action and adventure stories—like the Marvel comic book franchise—dominate the box office. Adding a stunt award would give the Academy the opportunity to recognize the popular action genre and keep the industry relevant with new audiences. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has rejected action designers every year from 1991 to 2012. But there is precedent for change. The last major category added was Best Animated Picture in 2001, and more recently the Academy has announced Best Casting as a category slated for the 2026 award season. Stunts have been a part of creating movie magic since the very beginning of filmmaking, making the stories we know and love more exciting and engaging. Urge the Academy: It’s time to finally pay homage to the action industry experts carrying the filmmaking tradition forward.

Ever since his confirmation hearings more than 30 years ago, the public has questioned Thomas's ethics and behavior. His abuse of power, his conflicts of interest, and his secrecy about his financial and political ties make him unfit to serve. Back in 2000, Justice Thomas complained about his salary—at the time it was $173,000—and implied he might leave the Supreme Court. And that’s when the gifts started rolling in. 38 vacations 26 private jet flights 8 flights by helicopter 12 VIP passes to sport events Luxury vacations in Florida and Jamaica And that’s just what was undisclosed. The value of the gifts he has received from Harlan Crow—who paid for Thomas’ vacations, his mother’s house, and nephew’s tuition—and other mega donors over the years is in the millions. He even accepted a loan from a healthcare executive to purchase a luxury RV, and then had a significant portion of that loan forgiven. Meanwhile, Thomas ruled against student debt relief for everyday Americans. Thomas has abused his position—from refusing to recuse himself from cases regarding his wife's involvement in the attempt to overturn the 2020 election to crusading on behalf of his right-wing allies to overturn abortion access and so much more. But since he refuses to resign, and Congress lags on impeachment, the late night host John Oliver has found a third option. $1M annually if Thomas resigns from the Supreme Court and a $2.4M tour bus. Thomas has 30 days to accept the offer—as he has accepted countless other gifts from wealthy donors. Tell Thomas to accept John Oliver’s offer and step down from the Supreme Court!

Country music is Black history. Country music, like many, many other genres, was invented by Black people, but racism, gatekeeping, whitewashing, and erasure in country music actively prevents Black artists from getting credit and being celebrated for their work. But this is not new. The latest? Beyoncé dropped two new country singles “Texas Hold ‘Em” and “16 Carriages,” and it wasn’t long before the racism, revisionist history, and gatekeeping began. First, Apple Music categorized the songs in the “Pop music” category when the songs are clearly country. And when fans started requesting Beyoncé’s new songs at their local country stations, many of their requests were rejected. One station, KYKC, even responded to a fan’s request saying “We do not play Beyonce on KYKC as we are a country music station." The country music industry must finally reckon with its own racism and anti-Blackness, celebrate the roots of country in Black history, and celebrate Black artists reclaiming a genre they birthed. A study discovered that out of 11,000+ songs played on country radio from 2002 to 2020, only 3% of those were from Black and brown artists, and of that 3%, only ⅓ were from Black and brown women. That means that Black and brown women represented only 0.001% of songs played by country radio over the course of 18 years. It’s outrageous, but unfortunately, unsurprising. This has to end NOW. The banjo, one of the central instruments in country music, originated in Africa and was brought to the United States by enslaved African people. White people then appropriated the banjo and began using it for minstrel shows, where they would wear Blackface and mock Black people and Black culture. It's disgusting and dehumanizing. This led to the rise of hillbilly music as a marketing category, which became associated with a white, rural, Southern audience. That’s when “race records” were created to segregate Black people out of the genre that they created, and music executives refused to let Black folks record songs that they deemed to be “hillbilly,” purposefully white-washing the genre even further. This history of country music shows how Jim Crow segregation harmed Black country music artists then, and still harms them today. Black music artists like Beyoncé are reclaiming country, a genre that was theirs to begin with. And we need to be in solidarity with them and challenge the status quo to pave the way for Black people to get a seat at a table that they created. We can’t sit idly by and watch this continue. Getting the country music industry---from radio stations to awards to other prominent artists---to honor Beyoncé’s new songs as country is just one small step to bringing about change. But with Beyoncé being the biggest artist in the world, this is an opportunity for us to keep pushing, educating, and fighting for change, and the impacts of our advocacy will pave the way for other Black country artists for generations to come. Will you take action now and sign the petition?

Country music is Black history. Country music, like many, many other genres, was invented by Black people, but racism, gatekeeping, whitewashing, and erasure in country music actively prevents Black artists from getting credit and being celebrated for their work. But this is not new. The latest? Beyoncé dropped two new country singles “Texas Hold ‘Em” and “16 Carriages,” and it wasn’t long before the racism, revisionist history, and gatekeeping began. First, Apple Music categorized the songs in the “Pop music” category when the songs are clearly country. And when fans started requesting Beyoncé’s new songs at their local country stations, many of their requests were rejected. One station, KYKC, even responded to a fan’s request saying “We do not play Beyonce on KYKC as we are a country music station." The country music industry must finally reckon with its own racism and anti-Blackness, celebrate the roots of country in Black history, and celebrate Black artists reclaiming a genre they birthed. A study discovered that out of 11,000+ songs played on country radio from 2002 to 2020, only 3% of those were from Black and brown artists, and of that 3%, only ⅓ were from Black and brown women. That means that Black and brown women represented only 0.001% of songs played by country radio over the course of 18 years. It’s outrageous, but unfortunately, unsurprising. This has to end NOW. In 2016, Beyoncé performed at the CMA awards and invited The Chicks to join her on stage to sing “Daddy Lessons.” The incredible performance was met with backlash from racist conservatives who said Beyoncé wasn’t “country enough” and didn’t belong. They felt the need to “protect” the genre from artists like Beyoncé (who has always been country). The day after the performance, fans noticed that there was no mention of Beyoncé, The Chicks, or their rendition of “Daddy Lessons” on the CMA website or social accounts, despite posting other performances from the night before, which made it seem like they were caving to the backlash from racist conservatives. Around 4:35 p.m after fans called them out, they finally shared the performance on its page. The CMA has a chance to make this right. Will you sign the petition to demand that they invite Beyoncé to perform at this year’s awards? The banjo, one of the central instruments in country music, originated in Africa and was brought to the United States by enslaved African people. White people then appropriated the banjo and began using it for minstrel shows, where they would wear Blackface and mock Black people and Black culture. It's disgusting and dehumanizing. This led to the rise of hillbilly music as a marketing category, which became associated with a white, rural, Southern audience. That’s when “race records” were created to segregate Black people out of the genre that they created, and music executives refused to let Black folks record songs that they deemed to be “hillbilly,” purposefully white-washing the genre even further. This history of country music shows how Jim Crow segregation harmed Black country music artists then, and still harms them today. Black music artists like Beyoncé are reclaiming country, a genre that was theirs to begin with. And we need to be in solidarity with them and challenge the status quo to pave the way for Black people to get a seat at a table that they created. We can’t sit idly by and watch this continue. Getting the country music industry---from radio stations to awards to other prominent artists---to honor Beyoncé’s new songs as country is just one small step to bringing about change. But with Beyoncé being the biggest artist in the world, this is an opportunity for us to keep pushing, educating, and fighting for change, and the impacts of our advocacy will pave the way for other Black country artists for generations to come. Will you take action now and sign the petition?

Our kids deserve the best education available to them and Mr. Cody meets that standard. A mistake made on the weekend outside of school should not dictate whether or not he is capable or suitable for his job. Mr. Cody is one of our best teachers in the school system. My daughter has always struggled in Math she just doesn’t get it, since she has moved up into high school and has had Mr. Cody not only have her grades skyrocketed for Math but her state test scores in Math have skyrocketed. Her UNDERSTANDING of the subject has went through the roof. She has went from testing below the state average to ABOVE it. And it is solely because of the methods and extra care that Mr. Cody takes with his students and her story is not the only one like it. Mr. Cody spends his planning periods and lunch hours whenever necessary helping students one on one. If they are behind he helps them catch up, if they just aren’t getting it he helps them. And he takes the time for those students out of his personal time. Instead of using his planning period he helps them and then goes home and does his planning. Instead of getting his personal time for lunch he helps them. He goes above and beyond his job. And it shows in our kids test scores. Not only does he do those things but he also makes your children comfortable in asking for the help. Which is something that can’t be said for most teachers. A lot of time the attitude our children have is that it’s not worth asking, because they won’t listen, or they’ll say no. Our kids not only get the help they need but feel safe and optimistic in asking for it. These kids love him not because he’s cool or he lets them mess around but because he legitimately helps them. He has their respect. We are the generation that voted for medical marijuanas legal status. So not only should we help keep a teacher that we KNOW is massively beneficial to our children’s education but we should fight for our medical legalization that we worked for. We should fight against the school for trying to make something that we pushed and voted for still a negatively looked upon thing, like it’s still makes you a pariah to have a medical card even one that recently expired. We need them to know that this is not a firable offense. Then, there are other teachers in the school who have not gotten marijuana possession charges on there own time that deserve to be forcefully resigned. That not everything should be about the way something looks. It should be about what’s best for our kids. What THEY deserve. If they wanna get rid of teachers, great! But let’s get rid of the ones that don’t care. That say things like… “well all my kids in this class are making C’s so it’s fine”. No it’s not fine, your not doing your job!!! That no matter how much effort your child puts into trying to catch up or understand something they get met with a do it yourself attitude. Who no matter how little they do they put their own failures onto your kids. The Lexington school system has done a lot of shady stuff to help themselves “save face” and we as parents HAVE to fight for the best interest of our kids. The school system needs to remember that they are at the bottom line emoloyed by the parents of this state. They are employed by our tax dollars and when they make poor decisions they have someone to answer to. That’s you. This community needs to come together on soooo many issues. And I feel strongly for our kids it needs to start here. Help us keep a valuable teacher, if we don’t, we senselessly lose him to another school. For what? Ask yourself that.

FOR THE STUDENTS!

The Infrastructure Improvement and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act have allocated billions of taxpayer dollars and created tax credits to support the creation of a hydrogen economy. Department of Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm first announced plans to bring down the price of hydrogen in 2021. Since then, her agency has led a process to create hydrogen hubs across the country. The idea is to use public funds to create a hydrogen industry by establishing regional hubs, or constellations of business ventures dedicated to hydrogen production, transportation, storage, and consumption. The DOE received at least 79 applications for hubs. In October, President Biden announced the seven hubs selected to receive a combined $7 billion. The hubs were selected, in part, based on the kind of hydrogen they would produce. Today, more than 95% of hydrogen is produced from methane gas using a process called steam methane reforming. It’s referred to as gray hydrogen. Because hydrogen can be produced by various methods from different feedstocks, scientists have begun assigning colors to differentiate its many forms. Black and brown are made from coal. They are all considered to be dirty forms of hydrogen. The DOE’s hubs would support forms of hydrogen the agency has put in the clean column, including pink made from nuclear energy, green made from renewable energy, and blue made from methane. Blue hydrogen is gray hydrogen with carbon capture and storage (CCS) added to the process. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as clean hydrogen. No matter the color of the rainbow it has been assigned, hydrogen has profound impacts on health and the environment and exacerbates climate change. Blue hydrogen, for instance, relies on unproven, some say disproven, CCS technology to address the CO2 emissions and locks in powerful methane emissions that come from creating the feedstock and powering the CCS process. Even green hydrogen considered to be the cleanest of the clean is anything but. Whether it’s green, pink, blue, orange, yellow, turquoise, white or any other color on the H2 rainbow, it is, after all, still hydrogen. - Hydrogen is the smallest molecule, which makes it prone to leaking. - Hydrogen is a highly flammable gas. - Hydrogen’s NOx emissions when combusted can be six times higher than methane’s. - Hydrogen is an indirect greenhouse gas whose Global Warming Potential, or GWP, is roughly 12 times that of CO2. Still other problems make hydrogen an impractical solution to the climate crisis. Producing hydrogen is extremely costly and energy-intensive. Producing green hydrogen is still prohibitively expensive and its renewable energy feedstock is still relatively scarce. Using renewable energy directly to electrify is far more efficient. Hydrogen is just one of the false climate solutions the fossil fuel industry has been promoting so it can continue to do business as usual. The resources going into creating a hydrogen economy should be going to pay for deployment of real, available, and scalable renewable energy solutions. Hydrogen is a distraction that is robbing us of time we don’t have to take real steps to address the climate crisis. Since June of 2021 when Secretary Granholm first announced the initiative to bring down the price of hydrogen, the public has been given little information about this tectonic economic shift and no voice in deciding if it is the right way forward. That is unacceptable. Tell the Department of Energy that our new economy must be built on truly clean and renewable energy solutions and that hydrogen has no place in it.

TikTok is one of the largest social media platforms right now, and taking direct, actionable steps to support artists and their labor, as well as to prevent artificial intelligence from stealing their work and likenesses, could be a model for how other platforms handle these issues moving forward. But it’s not just about being able to dance and do trends with some of our favorite music. Universal Music Group is pulling its music from TikTok after negotiations failed to extend the licensing agreement between the two companies, and those negotiations centered around prominent issues in today’s society: paying people for their labor, the effects of generative artificial intelligence more broadly, and benchmarks for online safety in a world that has become increasingly reliant on digital communications. TikTok needs to support artists and their labor.

The more people we have that express their concerns we feel that something might get resolved.

Our intersection of State st and Cleveland Ave NW has a long history of being the Greentown Square. It is the home of great businesses, holiday gatherings, and parades. During construction it would be very inconvenient for all of our residents that use this intersection multiple times a day. Any detours created could make our neighborhood side streets very busy and dangerous with extra traffic. Our side streets are narrow as it is and when the widening of Cleveland Ave happened in the late 90s our side streets became cut through routes for a lot of traffic. They became dangerous as they were unpatroled. None of our residents are willing to sacrifice the safety of our neighborhoods for a roundabout that we weren't interested in to begin with.