A network of anti-gun activists has asked the Ventura County Fairgrounds board to stop hosting gun shows. We are concerned about the influence that billboard marketing and the gun shows themselves have on our communities. The majority of the fair board does not agree. It's time for the Ventura County Fairgrounds to stop hosting gun shows. No State agency should promote and profit from the proliferation of firearms. (Thank you Cow Palace activists!) Background: Five gun shows are hosted every year at the Ventura County Fairgrounds, a state-owned property run by board members appointed by the CA governor. The fairgrounds are owned and managed by a division of the California Department of Food and Agriculture. Each show features hundreds of tables where firearms are bought, sold, and traded. The gun shows are also marketed to children -- admission free for children under age 12.

I am introducing legislation during the current short session to change North Carolina's marijuana possession law. The members of the General Assembly need to know that our states citizens support change. Between May 16 and June 15, let the legislators know how you feel.

Mayor Kenney has pledged to meet 100% of the City government’s energy needs with renewable sources by 2030. We want that clean energy to be generated locally so our air and water quality will improve and long-term economic development and jobs for Philadelphia residents will result. To make it real, the City should adopt our Solar Justice Program: long term renewable energy power purchase agreements; enforcing Economic Opportunity Plans to meet minority and union condition hiring goals; building solar generation on city-owned properties to meet at least 30% of city government energy needs by 2020; and enlisting other large institutions in Philadelphia to do the same.

Karla came to the United States from Mexico right before her third birthday. She used to be ashamed and afraid of being undocumented. But everything changed in November 2012 when she was able to obtain Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). Because of DACA, Karla was able to work as an intern at the University of Houston Law Center Immigration Clinic, where she began to champion her fellow immigrants by organizing DACA clinics, participating in actions, and organizing legislative campaigns to protect undocumented students just like her. This month, Karla graduated from law school and will continue to be a champion for immigrants as an immigration attorney. Congress has had MONTHS to act, yet they’ve still failed to pass a Dream Act that would protect Dreamers like Karla, and hundreds of thousands of young immigrants like her. They are as American as anybody else in their graduating class, yet they may face deportation if Speaker Paul Ryan and Congressional Republicans don’t act. Tell Speaker Ryan: allow a vote on the Dream Act now! We cannot keep putting the future of Dreamers on hold.

This is happening all over the country at an alarming rate. Let's take away these individuals incentive by keeping them anonymous.

The Northwestern University Institute for Sexual and Gender Minority Health and Wellbeing (ISGMH) is asking the public to join in standing against the erasure of LGBTQ identities. On May 17th, The Williams Institute broke the news that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) may no longer collect sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) data through the Behavior Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS). The potential removal of these LGBTQ questions from BRFSS is harmful to the nation’s ability to detect LGBTQ health disparities. Health and research institutions across the country, including ISGMH, have highlighted the importance of surveillance systems such as BRFSS in identifying and subsequently addressing the health disparities of LGBTQ populations. If the SOGI questions are removed from BRFSS, the federal government will have chosen not only to disregard the recommendations of experts in the field but to ignore its own guidelines to improve LGBTQ health data surveillance. The Healthy People 2020 Recommendations state that “Collecting SOGI data in health-related surveys and health records in order to identify LGBT health disparities,” is a critical method to improve LGBTQ health. Read the full statement: http://isgmh.northwestern.edu/2018/05/18/isgmh-responds-to-planned-cdc-rollback-of-sexual-orientation-and-gender-identity-questions-in-the-behavioral-risk-factor-surveillance-system-brfss/

The Army Corps of Engineers & the Chicago Department of Transportation want to build a toxic dump in the 10th Ward. The proposed site will contain lead, manganese, CBD's, coal tar and other toxic materials. The Southeast Side currently has 8 landfills. It is not the dumping ground for the city of Chicago! We do not want this in our community.

I'm a parent of a student going into high school this coming school year. I want them to be able to study and learn without the fear of being shot at in the hallways. It is our duty to petition the officials that represent we the people to provide reasonable care while in the hands of our schools.

We did it!!! Thanks to all of you signing this petition, the Vernon Hills Park District Board of Commissioners officially and unanimously voted to oppose supporting the advancement of the proposed water reservoir at Carriage Green Park at their 5/24/18 board meeting. Aaron Lawlor, Lake County Board Chairman, also heard you and the park district board and sent the following great news: ========================================================= Below from Aaron Lawlor, Lake County Board Chairman (5/25/18): I have requested that the Lake County Public Works Department eliminate Carriages Green Park as location for a new water reservoir. As your representative, your concerns are my concerns. And the more we learned, the more concerned we were! Not only would the proposed reservoir encroach on an already undersized community park; it would also likely create an attractive nuisance with the potential for injury, accidents and liability. Following our conservation, I spoke with our Public Works staff and have concluded there are no engineering options that sufficiently address the concerns you and your neighbors shared with me over the past couple weeks. I want to thank you and the Carriages of Grosse Pointe neighborhood for your outreach. In the future, I have asked staff from LCPW, the Village of Vernon Hills and the Park District to engage me in these types of conversations earlier in the planning process as we could have headed this off as an unworkable option much sooner. Please share this message with the HOA leadership as well as the recipients and signers of the petition. As always, please feel free to reach out on this or any other issue. Best, Aaron ==================================================== Please REMOVE the meeting dates from your calendar as the meetings are no longer necessary! • Saturday, June 9 at 9:00am • Thursday, June 28 at 6:30pm Thank you, again, for your active support in preserving our park and protecting our property values!!

I have been personally victimized by the lack of a lazy river at Lake Lanier Islands long enough. IT'S TIME FOR CHANGE.

A House bill introduced at the General Assembly on April 26 would allow the Providence Water Supply Board, which provides water to 60% of Rhode Islanders, to be sold or leased to a private or quasi-private entity. An identical Senate bill is due for a hearing on Tuesday, May 29 at 4:30 p.m. or later in Room 313 of the RI State House. Providence Mayor Jorge Elorza supports this legislation because he wants to raise money for the City of Providence's pension fund, which is currently funded at 26%. While the pension fund is a serious issue, water, a critical public resource and the foundation of our health and economic well-being, should not be used to correct decades of fiscal mismanagement by the City of Providence. Privatizing water, or using a public-private partnership to manage water, has been tried in the US and abroad and has led to corruption, environmental hazards, water rates that rise by 59 percent, poor service and damage to infrastructure. The public loses control over a resource we cannot live without, and cities have spent tens of millions to reclaim public control over the water utility.

Recently SDOT has suggested replacing the Garfield Street Bridge with something much inferior to what is there today. This gateway is key in and out of our part of the city as many learned during the 2001 rebuild from the Nisqually Earthquake. In November 2015, Seattle voters approved a 9-year, $930 million transportation Levy to Move Seattle, providing funding to improve safety for all travelers, maintain our streets and bridges, and invest in reliable, affordable travel options for a growing city. The levy provides roughly 30% of the City's transportation budget and replaces the 9-year, $365 Bridging the Gap levy approved by voters in 2006. The residents of Magnolia believed that we were part of this levy and supported it by a large margin. Since this levy we’ve learned that bike lanes in the city are costing more than $13MM per mile. Due to this overspend, we’ve heard the following "We do not have enough funding right now to do everything that was promised, we just don't," said the city's interim Department of Transportation (SDOT) chief, Goran Sparrman, at an oversight meeting last week. Sparrman added that "some of those dollar amounts estimated for what projects would cost were clearly insufficient, even at the time." This isn’t an acceptable answer The residents of Magnolia ask you to work with us to determine the best solution for the bridge. This city is home to more than 25 Fortune 500 companies, and a wide array of smart people. Engage us to help determine how we can do more for less, and ensure that Seattle is a place our grandchildren are proud to call home.