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New SP Discussion YahooGroup – sonoraprogressivediscussion@yahoogroups.com - I have set up a new yahoo discussion group to receive more frequent news and views for those who are frustrated at one very long newsletter each week and missing action bulletins or breaking news between times, and to discuss with each other things of mutual import. Let’s talk! Members can post.
SP Newsletter items – please send to me at gerrypaxis@mindspring.com
Sonora Progressives Business
Regular Meeting Feb 28, Election of Officers, 7pm Dem HQ
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Citizen Participation Teams Heard a great presentation last night from former AZ state legislator Dr. Ted Downing. Will meet again with Ted Downing on Wed, March 14, 7pm Dem HQ. We were not shocked but unhappy to learn that all of our e-activism and email flooding really does very little good in its current form, except that legislators are interested in pleasing organized groups, so as to win re-election – but organized groups with lobbyists and funding of course wield more influence. Actually, with R’s in charge of the legislature, there is very little possibility that ANY Dem legislation would even get a hearing – and Ted tells us that people vote for the bill or not not on the merits of the bill, but on party caucus directives and who owes who or who has angered leadership of one party or another. Ted described how things really work in the legislature (and congress) and it is clear that points of influence have to do with the BUDGET (who pays, who gets), and citizen testimony during hearings.
TO DO: Before next month’s CPT meeting, call Jo Grant at the legislative offices in Tucson 398-6000, and sign up to testify in hearings from your home computer. Since very few citizens do this, and your (very brief) email shows up directly on the computers of the legislators in session, this is a powerful entrée. We are each to prepare ourselves as follows, experiment with the system, and then we will brainstorm further.
Then go to http://www.azleg.gov/ and look for HOUSE committee agendas. WE have already opened communication with house Dem leadership, so let’s start there. Find a bill that is to be heard, and check it out at bill info. http://www.azleg.gov/Bills.asp Sign in then, middle of the page AZlLEG “request to speak,” and activate your voice!!!!
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Lobbying meetings over the congressional break - H.R. 508 - The Bring Our Troops Home and Iraq Sovereignty Restoration Act."
Who will help with this? Please contact me (Gerry) ASAP - PDA National Issue Organizing Team to End the U.S. Occupation of Iraq and Redirect Funding to Human Needs! Diane@pdamerica.org, PDA, in cooperation with Military Families Speak Out, Code Pink and other groups, are setting up creative lobbying meetings with Congressional Reps next week. In S. AZ, we need to set up a thank you meeting with Rep. Grijalva. (Let’s buy him pink roses from our friends at Roses and More) and a meeting with Rep. Giffords urging her support for bills putting an end to the occupation. There is a conference call on March 21 to report our results. Please review the letters faxed by Military Families Speak Out (MFSO) to 535 Senators and Members of Congress today saying: Support our Troops and De-Fund the War! It was signed by over 200 MFSO members with loved ones currently serving in Iraq or about to deploy/re-deploy. Military Families Speak Out letter campaign links: http://www.mfso.org/downloads/OpenLetter.pdf It is suggested we bring those letters with us or write our own.
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Tucson Peace Fair, Feb 24, Reid Park, 10-4 – see you there!
News and Views
Iraq
Check the PDA front page often for news: http://www.pdamerica.org/
While you are there, please press red button, and sign on as a Sustaining Member (monthly contribution of $10 or more, so they can budget)
Film Showing Sunday - I (Gerry) am showing the DFA-distributed film, “the war tapes” on Sunday at 5pm at my home in Catalina, and you are invited. This was filmed by three soldiers, providing a glimpse of their lives, and their family’s lives, in the midst of war. 4721 E. Wagon Train – Oracle Rd – E. on Golder Ranch, No. on Lago del Oro, West on Rail N. which turns into Wagon Train. Corner of Windmill.
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Read Tucson Code Pink’s Nancy Hill’s Build Peace blog, http://www.buildpeace.blogspot.com/ on her fascinating month in DC. Hats off to Nancy for her actions and for her wonderful reporting of them. Please do check it out! Power to the Peaceful.
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PDA Board member and S.AZ Rep. Raúl Grijalva spoke on the House floor concerning H.Con.Res 63, Watch the floor speech
Raul will be speaking with Nancy Pelosi, Harry Mitchell and Ed Pastor at the Arizona State University Memorial Union Arizona Room at Monday, 2/19, at 2 PM. They will be speaking about College Loans. Raul will also be holding a sub committee meeting in Tucson on Saturday the 24th. (good time to bring him flowers) Pelosi has said Bush cannot invade Iran without prior authorization and will act to make that very clear (http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/daily/nationworld/42131)
Related - http://www.c-span.org/resources/house_feb2007.asp Go here to watch cspan clips of congressional speeches this week on the resolution opposing the escalation. I invite you to focus a moment on the speech given by Rep Tom Lantos of California, a primary co-sponsor of the resolution, the only Holocaust survivor in Congress, and co-chair of the bipartisan Congressional Human Rights Caucus, which also includes our own Rep. Raul Grijalva, and Rep. Ed Pastor from Maricopa County, as well as AZ Republicans Trent Franks and Jeff Flake, and AZ Senator Jon Kyle. Lantos’ moving personal story is here. http://lantos.house.gov/HoR/CA12/About+Tom/A+Holocaust+Survivor/A+Holocaust+Survivor.htm
It is worth the time to listen to what Nancy Pelosi said, as House speaker. I also enjoyed listening to Maxine Waters, Chair of the House Out of Iraq caucus. No one has born the burden of the president’s failed Iraq policies more than our troops and their families. We will win Engage and unite rather than attempting to overpower and conquer. Who are we fighting? I don’t think our soldiers know, nor does this president. She speaks of de-funding...the war giant whose appetite cannot be satisfied.
Nothing in these speeches will bring our troops home any time soon, but it is a start, and it does put each of our representatives in the public record with a telling speech and vote yea or nay.
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Must - see :Web of Deceit: Made for European television film never broadcast in North America.
The well put-together documentary truth of the extent to which we in the west have been complicit in Saddam Hussein’s brutality. Check out Lando's new book "Web of Deceit" and his blog at http://barrylando.com/ Here is the basic link to the series. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17053.htm You can watch each segment within this page. If you go to youtube, it is much harder to follow.
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Free war & corporations film series, 3rd & 4th Mondays Feb -May - 6:30pm
4639 e. 1st st. (democratic party hq); rsvp. schedule subject to change
2/19, ''iraq for sale''
2/26: ''orwell rolls in his grave,''
series cosponsored by democracy organizing group and pima county democratic party
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Election Integrity:
Auditor John R Brakey
Or contact Sandra Spangler Sandra Spangler
Great article on John Brakey and his/our EIC work in this week’s Tucson Weekly: Watchdogs worry that someone's been sneaking a peek at early-ballot results before Election Day
Peep Show http://www.tucsonweekly.com/gbase/Currents/Content?oid=92557
PUBLISHED ON FEBRUARY 15, 2007: Election watchdog John Brakey says the county needs better safeguards to prevent the leak of early election results. The Pima County Democratic Party is suing the Pima County Board of Supervisors and Treasurer Beth Ford, seeking access to records that have been sealed away in the county's vault with ballots from the 2006 elections http://www.tucsonweekly.com/gbase/Currents/Content?oid=92557
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Mark your calendar, and please do try to be there:
Steve Freeman “was the 2004 presidential election stolen? Exit polls, election fraud and the official Count”
Lecture & Book Signing on Friday, February 23,
Plumbers and Steamfitters Union Hall
2475 East Water Street
6:30-9pm
Suggested Contribution: $10 to benefit Pima County Democratic Party Election Integrity Committee
Sponsored by the Pima County Democratic party.
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Environment:
Sign up for Sustainable Tucson discussion yahoo group and meetings:
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Sierra Club AZ legislative recommendations:
All the energy stored in the earth's reserves of coal, oil, and natural gas is equal to the energy from only 20 days of sunshine.
HB2275 local energy conservation codes (Sinema, Gallardo: Ch Campbell, et al.) requires municipalities to adopt the International Energy Conservation Code for residential and commercial construction. SUPPORT.
HB2491 solar energy tax credit; application (Mason, Boone: Anderson, et al.) is merely a technical correction bill to clarify the
commercial solar energy tax credit program established last year and make it clear that the credit can be claimed by a third party. SUPPORT.
HB2493 energy production; tax credit (Mason, Burton Cahill, Flake, et al.) provides a new individual and corporate income tax
credit through December 31, 2011, for a taxpayer who produces and sells electricity from Combined Heat and Power (CHP). The credit is equal to one and a half cents multiplied by the total kilowatt hours of electricity or one and one tenths cents multiplied by the total horsepower hours of power. It includes an overall cap of $2 million dollars and a limit of $100,000 on the maximum tax incentive for any single installation. The tax credit for a 1 megawatt (MW) project would amount to about $100,000, and it is likely that most projects in Arizona would be less than 1 MW and would include facilities like hospitals, hotels, schools, and industrial users. SUPPORT.
HB2494 energy; water; savings loan fund (Mason, Aboud, O’Halleran, et al.) develops a revolving loan fund of $25 million to assist existing state facilities and schools in implementing energy and water saving projects and in meeting the energy saving goals and standards contained in HB2497. State facilities and schools would repay the loans using their energy and water cost savings, and the funding would then be made available for another project. SUPPORT.
HB2495 schools; energy performance standards (Mason, Aboud, Bee, et al.) implements energy and water performance standards which are approved by the School Facilities Board. All new school projects approved after June 30, 2007, must meet these new standards. It requires the School Facilities Board to consider Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards for new schools. The LEED standard was developed by the U.S. Green Building Council and offers four levels of certification – certified, silver, gold, or platinum. Six categories are evaluated under the LEED standard. They include: Sustainable Sites, Water Efficiency, Energy and Atmosphere, Materials and Resources, and Indoor Environmental Quality. LEED has been adopted nationwide by federal agencies, state and local governments, and private companies. SUPPORT
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