PVA Working Groups

Legislative Response Team

I am pleased to announce that I will be coordinating the Legislative Response Team again this year. For those of you who don't know, last year we had a special volunteer team that was willing to call the Round House in Santa Fe, regarding progressive issues, at key points in the debate process. As I recall, there were about 65 signed up to make calls to pertinent legislators when it was deemed necessary. Most calls were to support various versions of minimum wage legislation, but we also had an impact on environmental issues as well as health care reform.

In the end, many of our projects weren't codified by the legislature, due to a lack of time, but our efforts were definitely helpful and noted by our legislators. Several said they had never had such large numbers of constituent input on any issues before.

Here's how this works. You start by giving me your name and e-mail address. I make a data base that I will only use to send you “action alerts” during the legislative session. We try to keep the alerts to a minimum, however, toward the end of the session, we made calls several times per week.

When I am contacted by working group leaders, who basically give me the information of whom we need to call and what we need to say, I forward it on to the team. The team members make a phone call or maybe two or three, stating either agreement or opposition to a specific piece of legislation. It is quick, simple, and easy to do.

Thanks so much!

Jim Moore
freebird2020@comcast.net