NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, be a leader by making the NBA the first major sports league to allow its players to use marijuana without being punished.

Sign our petition to demand that companies like Mars and Nestle stop using child slave labor in their chocolate products!

I stand with the nurses and techs at Lawrence + Memorial Hospital. Nurses and techs are an essential part of a patients care. Nurses and Techs are taking a stand and I am going to stand with them. Please work with the nurses, techs and their union.

I urge you to take action by:   1. **Investigating Utility Pricing** – Ensuring power companies are held accountable for fair pricing and transparency.   2. **Advocating for Rate Caps or Relief Programs** – Introducing measures to cap excessive energy costs and expand financial assistance programs for low-income households.     Our community cannot continue to bear this financial strain. We need strong leadership to fight for fair and affordable power bills. 

Stop the hate on gays, support gay marriage.

No jusice served, let our voices be heard.

Dear Commissioner, We are the residents of the “affordable housing” or MULTE (Multiple-Unit Limited Tax Exemption) homes at The Prescott. We are 31 of the more than 1800 MULTE households in Portland. We urgently need your help. Our homes were constructed with generous fee waivers and forgone property tax revenue from the City of Portland and supposed to be protected as “affordable”. Yet, many of us are now facing up to rent increases of as much as $400 (50%!) starting November 1, 2022. This is because gentrification in the Portland area has caused median income to rapidly increase, and the city allows MULTE landlords to increase their "affordable" rents at the same rate, despite the fact that our individual incomes have not budged. Our building, like every other MULTE building, is less than 15 years old and thus not protected by rent control. We fail to understand how the age of our building means we can afford such an extreme rent increase, especially while that building is receiving public subsidies. This exemption means that all of our neighbors throughout the City living in MULTE buildings are in danger of receiving similar increases. We cannot afford these increases. We cannot afford to move with the current relocation payments which were based on 2016 rents. We need your help. We are are seniors, single parents, people with disabilities and chronic health issues, people on fixed incomes, and people who have formerly experienced homelessness prior to living at the Prescott. These rent increases are a life-threatening event. We, as certified “low income” MULTE tenants, deserve the same protections offered to residents of other affordable housing programs, including (but not limited to) a cap of 5% on rent increases which is equivalent to the protections that residents in state regulated affordable housing receive. We have learned that our problems don’t end with this rent increase; we know that the building will lose all affordability protections in June 2024 when all of the MULTE protections expire. At which point we could get rent increases exceeding $1000 to bring our rents to market without rent control protections. We at The Prescott are not alone - THOUSANDS of families in other MULTE buildings will also lose these protections when the10-year affordability expires. You kicked the can down the road in 2012 when you developed this program, without a plan for what to do when the buildings expire. These glaring loopholes in your program have only postponed the threat of homelessness for these families. The can can't be kicked any further down the road. The time for action is now. For these reasons we ask that you urgently pursue the following actions: 1. Immediately enact a policy or rules change that limits rent increases in MULTE units to 5% per year, and* that entitles tenants in MULTE units to more relocation assistance to offset the costs of displacement, with a retroactive effect that protects us. (*Using the 2017 template of relocation-passage to protect Normandy and Titan residents which went into effect immediately and applied to already-issued rent increases.) 2. If policy/rule changes cannot be enacted in time to avert The Prescott increases, commit to subsidizing rent increases down to the 5% level for the duration of the MULTE contract, for all impacted MULTE residents. 3. Many Prescott tenants have been on waiting lists for years, only to move in and discover they'll be forced out next year when the affordability expired. Thus we ask that you require all current and prospective MULTE residents be notified of affordability expiration immediately, at time of application, and at time of joining a waitlist for a MULTE unit. 4. Our landlord used deceptive language to make us believe we were exempt from relo. This is unconscionable. Therefore, require that all landlords issuing rent increases use a standardized form (already) created by the City to AFFIRMATIVELY inform tenants of their relocation rights, so as to avoid confusing language meant to misinform or mislead tenants about relocation. 5. PREVENT MORE HOMELESSNESS: Immediately develop a MULTE relocation/anti-displacement plan to address the impact of the 15-year exemption on rent control for low-income residents living in expiring MULTE properties. Without your intervention to modify the oversights related to the MULTE program and the 15-year exemption rule, some of our residents will find themselves without shelter. Vulnerable people are already in place here; the cost to the City of finding them a different home and providing services would far exceed the cost of intervention. Please act now. Sincerely, The Prescott MULTE Tenants Union

Water is a human right and all people deserve access to safe and affordable water. I urge you to take immediate action to stop the ongoing, discriminatory, devastating attacks on Detroit's water access; restore all water services, call off the water shutoffs, and ensure fair and affordable water access for all Detroit residents by maintaining full public control of the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department municipal water system.

End your policy of separating children from their families and prosecuting migrants crossing the U.S. - Mexico border, many of whom are seeking asylum!

VETO HB 77 - PROTECT AND DO NOT ERODE THE ALREADY LIMITED FLORIDA RENTER'S RIGHTS. Changes sought to Florida’s Residential Landlord Tenant Act by SB 490 erode tenant protections and create more confusion than clarity to the Act, placing Florida’s 5 million residential tenants in jeopardy. This delete-all amendment proposed in Regulated Industries would, among other things: ALLOW LANDLORDS TO EVICT WITHOUT NOTICE FOR MINOR VIOLATIONS Subject tenants to eviction without a termination notice by removing the requirement of the notice of termination in cases of a “right to cure” violation. For example, a college student parking in the wrong space anytime during a 12-month period after notice would be subject to eviction without notice and may have no idea why they are being evicted. (Section 8, 83.56 (2) (b)) CREATE A “PAY WHAT YOU CAN” PRACTICE BUT RISKING EVICTION Allow the landlord to accept partial rent and still evict the tenant – allowing landlord’s to abuse tenant’s by encouraging them to “pay what you have” but still evicting them, with no guarantee the tenant will receive a receipt or that the landlord will indicate the partial payment if an eviction is filed. (Section 8, 83.56(5)(a) RENDER EVICTION NOTICES FOR APARTMENTS MEANINGLESS Allows landlords and their attorneys’ unlimited opportunity to “fix” notices no matter how glaring the error. Completely erodes the purpose of the notices – to provide tenants an opportunity to save their homes – since there will be no repercussions for inadequate notices. (Section 11, 83.60(1)(a)) TENANTS GET ONE SCREEN REPAIR A YEAR Current law requires landlords to maintain screens, crucial to the low income saving money on utilities. This bill bizarrely limits screen repair to once a year. HB77 would give unscrupulous Landlords more power to initiate retaliatory evictions, for instance, if a tenant complains to an agency because they have no windows, leaking ceilings, no water, heat, etc. Working class renters ARE at risk already, especially if they cannot afford counsel. We need more laws to protect tenants, anything less will most likely cause an increase in homelessness, and a housing crisis for those who fall at the hand of irresponsible Landlords and the laws that protect them. Protect Florida’s Tenants! DO NOT SIGN HB 77, VETO HB 77 AND VOTE NO ON HB 77