A petition to ban single use plastics in Michigan and require substitution of biodegradable alternative products would be a great way to protect and promote environmental stewardship of the State of Michigan and of the Great Lakes ecosystem.

I'm a teacher and am infuriated by the subsidies coming out of the school budget to fund vanity projects of the 1% through Tax Increment Financing program!

The Kansas Senate has voted to put a $100 a year tax on electric vehicles and a $50 tax on hybrids. This will affect you in the future regardless of what you drive right now. You will one day be driving an electric car. I bought a hybrid because I wanted to reduce the pollution that is making our children sick. My next car is going to be an electric vehicle if I can still afford to keep it registered in Kansas. Because our former governor raided the highway funds is no reason to punish every low or zero emission car owner in Kansas for his mistake. It is unfair! No New Taxes! It is also a short-sighted tax, as it will raise only $300,000 next year for the highway fund. Encouraging the use of electric vehicles could potentially save us billions of dollars in healthcare costs. Air pollution, especially particulates, nitrogen oxides, and ozone are leading factors in lung diseases, cancer, and heart attacks. Electric vehicles reduce air pollution by half, or even more if charged from renewable energy. The electricity to charge them is produced at power plants and, the large power plants are about twice as efficient as internal combustion engines. Even if charged from a coal fired power plant, the electric vehicles would account for a 50% reduction in air pollution, or 75% if charged with Westar electricity which produces half of its energy from nuclear and wind. Which is the most fiscally responsible? Raising $300,000 with a tax on electric vehicles, or saving millions of dollars on healthcare costs? And, what value can be put on clean air and a healthy environment for our children and grandchildren?

Background It has come to our attention that Lido Island Community Association (LICA) Board of Directors (Board) and the Major Capital Improvements Committee (MCIC) have requested permission from the City of Newport Beach to redesign the medians, the windows to the bay and other public spaces on the island. The cost is estimated upwards of $100,000. Due to this cost and the extent of the proposed landscape changes, we, the undersigned, request such improvements undergo further and more comprehensive input from residents. An island-wide improvement is planned. However, information has been shared inequitably among residents about proposed changes. In February, Lido Isle residents whose homes border the landscaped islands located on Piazza Lido received a hand-delivered flyer informing them of an MCIC decision to re-landscape the Piazza medians. The flyer also invited these particular residents to attend a February 26 meeting at the Clubhouse to review proposed plans for Piazza Lido only. For most recipients, this notice was the first news of the project although meeting minutes of LICA Board (2/13/19) and MCIC (1/31/19) appear in the March 2019 Lido Islander. Residents living on other streets, i.e.non-recipients of the flyer, were given no notice of the February 26 meeting. To wit, the landscaping of the Piazza Lido medians is part of a larger plan to re-landscape all medians on Lido (Via Antibes; Via Genoa and Via San Remo) as well as parks off main streets on the island (Via Firenze, Koron/Soud, Orvieto/Soud, Waziers/Soud, Antibes/Nord). While efforts to improve the island landscapes are appreciated, many of the residents whose homes face the medians as well as others who pass by them daily, have specific concerns about the proposed improvements. At the same time, updating the Landscape Design Guidelines for Lido Isle is crucial. These guidelines will bring a comprehensive design to all landscapes on Lido in conformance with City standards and will serve as a template for future island improvements. Islanders deserve attractive landscapes consistent with other areas of comparable property values overseen by homeowner’s associations, for example, Newport Coast and Emerald Bay. Any proposed design should be in keeping with Lido’s Mediterranean heritage and consider water-wise garden practices as is consistent with Mediterranean landscapes. All Lido property owners’ dues ensure them input into decisions made in their interest. With the extraordinary resources available on Lido we should be setting the highest standard for innovation, conservation, and aesthetics within the City and beyond. While the undersigned appreciate the time and effort LICA has expended on these projects, we request further community-wide discussions before moving forward on any landscaping projects now under consideration. These issues affect all Lido residents. Concerns include the establishment of updated design guidelines by qualified professionals that provide for unity of design and plantings on Lido in conformance with City standards as well as equitable input by residents.

This is the height of hypocrisy, bad faith, and bullying. In Chicago, the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) has launched a vicious attack on Kim Foxx -- the first black woman to ever serve as State’s Attorney for Cook County -- and her criminal justice reform agenda. The FOP says their attack is about Kim Foxx’s decision not to bring Jussie Smollett’s case to trial. But the FOP has consistently attacked Kim Foxx ever since she was elected on a platform of holding police accountable when they abuse their power. Here’s the ugly truth: Chicago’s Fraternal Order of Police is cynically trying to politically kneecap the one official in Chicago with the power and the will to stand up to them. The fact is that the FOP has never cared much about the rule of law. Let’s look at their track record for the receipts. When Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke shot 17 year old Laquan McDonald in the back -- and then Van Dyke and other officers covered it up by lying on a police report and suppressing evidence -- the Fraternal Order of Police defended the dirty cops to the bitter end. Then, after the city fired Van Dyke for killing McDonald, the FOP gave the killer cop a job! For decades the FOP defended a disgraced Chicago cop, Jon Burge, who was fired for torturing people until they confessed to murders they didn’t commit, putting them on death row. When Burge was fired, the FOP tried to honor him with a float in a parade. They paid for his legal defense when he was finally brought up on charges years later. When Burge died last year, the FOP didn’t disavow his heinous actions. Instead, they declared, “The Fraternal Order of Police does not believe the full story about the Burge cases has ever been told.” Former FOP president Dean Angelo took it a step further, saying, “I don't know that Jon Burge got a fair shake based on the years and years of service that he gave the city.” This is just the tip of the iceberg. Time after time, the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police has stood by crooked police officers who committed heinous acts that violate the rule of law, the public’s trust, and the oath they took to defend us all. We need to put their dishonest attacks on Kim Foxx in this context and recognize them for what they are: a nakedly political attempt to destroy the first black woman to serve as state’s attorney and hamper her reformist agenda. It could be that Kim Foxx erred in her handling Jussie Smollett’s case. But she certainly doesn’t deserve to lose her job or the public’s trust over one mistake. The fact is that the Chicago police union doesn’t care about Jussie Smollett. They don’t care about justice. They care about maintaining a culture of impunity and lawlessness for cops, an agenda that Kim Foxx opposes. Whatever we think of Jussie Smollett, now is the time for people of good will -- folks who believe that police should be held accountable when they violate the public’s trust -- to call out the Fraternal Order of Police for their bullying, bad-faith attacks on Kim Foxx.

The Annie E. Casey Foundation states “Research shows that placement into a secure detention facility can have an outsized impact on the ultimate case outcomes for court-involved youth – with potentially profound and negative consequences….Youth who spend time in custody are less likely to complete high school, less likely to find employment, and more likely to suffer mental health problems than comparable youth who are not detained. In addition detained youth are more likely to be re-arrested, adjudicated or convicted for new offenses and incarcerated than youth who remain at home awaiting court or pending placement”. · The Governor has recently been quoted as saying that the “Raise the Age” Bill is a progressive piece of legislation. He is sadly mistaken. New York State is the 49th out of 50 States to start treating 16 and 17-year-olds as juveniles and furthermore, the implementation of the Bill is outdated and regressive. There is a disconnect between the actual legislation and the implementation. · The State adopted a reform bill called “Close to Home” in 2012. This means that children should be kept in their communities and close to their families and not shipped away. The bill appears to apply only to New York City and not the surrounding counties. Therefore the State is encouraging Westchester County Department of Probation to build an 80 bed detention facility for a 14 county region. Most of these youth have not been adjudicated. The counties are: Westchester, Rockland, Orange, Putnam, Delaware, Broome, Duchess, Ulster, Sullivan, Columbia, Greene, Schoharie, Nassau and Suffolk. Some of the counties are over two (2) hours away. Shouldn’t the “Close to Home” policy be applied to all children in New York State? · As part of the Raise the Age agreement, New York State is willing to pay $1,200 a bed for County children and $2,400 for out of County, thus creating an incentive to ship children away from their communities. (In contrast, the 40 year old Youth Shelter Program of Westchester located in Mount Vernon has a per diem rate of $200 and provides many more services and a much lower recidivism rate than the County detention center.) Why these discrepancies in per diem rates? · The Raise the Age funding is limited to incarceration. It does not include any money for community prevention/diversion. We recommend that for every dollar spent on incarceration there be a dollar for dollar match for prevention/diversion. · Community Prevention/Diversion starts with the Police. When police officers are poised to arrest a youth they have many alternatives to arrest and incarceration at their disposal: community service; church sponsored youth groups; community centers with tutoring programs, youth courts; alternatives to incarceration centers; and wrap around mental health services all imbedded in the community. Arrest should be the last resort. · As compensation for a strain on the Juvenile Justice System New York State is providing money for construction and staffing of a jail for children. Is there data to justify this thinking? Is there an agency looking at the Juvenile Justice System as a whole? Will the incipient legalization or decriminalization of Marijuana affect the numbers? Will we continue to have a disproportionate number of Children of Color incarcerated in our County? Do we know who is being diverted and who is being incarcerated? Have we consulted with the other 48 States as to what is the most effective and appropriate system? This incarceration plan is a travesty for our young people and needs to be stopped, and re-evaluated. We need to redirect funding and reach deep into our communities to raise up the services that would welcome our youth as a diversion from incarceration. We need to do it NOW!

Right now, 1 in 3 American families struggle to afford diapers for their babies. We need to fix this, because when families can’t afford diapers, it can put a baby’s health at risk and negatively impact the overall financial well-being of a family. This is why we need to pass the Diaper Need Act of 2019. The inability to access diapers can force parents to keep their children in soiled diapers (exposing them to health risks) and can prevent them from enrolling their babies in childcare. And families who experience diaper need have increased stress on employment and finances. In fact, one impact study showed that over half of parents with diaper need missed work or school because they didn’t have enough diapers when dropping their children off at childcare. The Diaper Need Act that was introduced by US Congresswoman Barbara Lee (CA) and Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (CT) will create a $100 million program charged with distributing free diapers and diapering products (including cloth diapering supplies, diaper cream, and wipes) to neighborhoods across the nation to help reduce the diaper need among families. The bill also defines diapers as “medically necessary” so that families can purchase them through health savings accounts and HRAs.

I would like to catch the attention of the "World Wide Wild Life Federation" to help stop the trafficking and the extinction of the pangolins, also known as the anteater. They have been around for about 80 million years and have a lifespan of about twenty years. They are located in Africa, East Asia, India, and China. They are delicate, have needs that are not easily met in captivity, and therefore do not survive long when captured ... All species of pangolin are classified as "Threatened to Extinction" by the IUCN. Please help me save the pangolins!

Our community residents have experienced break-ins from outside locals. Unfortunately, our gates are constantly broken which allows non-residents to enter at any time. We have had a large number of car break-ins in the last month, and we want management to either install a boom barrier to allow only one car at the time.

A prime example is the fact that they never notified ANY neighbor regarding the last election held in February, therefore, securing their position for another 3 years.

I am initiating this petition because of a person called Jawar Mohammed, Hate preacher, instigating genocide among Ethiopian Society. Because of Mr. Jawar’s hate messages, in less than seven months thousands of people were massacred and millions have been displaced from their original inhabitation. Many citizens have been exposed to a dire life and death situation. His vicious and controversial messages have filled the society with animosity. Therefore, before the country engulfs to never-ending civil war, we should stop Jawar.

There is a public safety issue in the parking garages at Providence Alaska Medical Center. I have coworkers that have had their vehicles broken into THREE TIMES. My own car has been broken into just to see what was in the glove box. I have seen people breaking into cars and am scared to walk to my vehicle. We are the people inside caring for your loved ones, and our cries for help are not being heard. We need more secure parking for our employees, patients, and patient families.