Florida Activists Need You

As we continue to fight against President Donald Trump’s corporate priorities and the new anti-worker Republican agenda in Washington, I want to tell you about a bold new pilot program that Progress For All will be launching to build a team of statewide activists and give them the opportunity to fully participate in the political process during the 2017 Florida State Legislative Session.

Senator Bernie Sanders has been calling on all of us to step up and get involved in the local level. We are doing just that! In collaboration with the Center for Economic and Fiscal Policy – a Tallahassee-based 30-year-old think tank that advocates for policies to help low-and-moderate income individuals and their families – we are opening a “People’s Advocacy Center” which will provide overnight accommodations for hundreds of  people on a daily basis during the 2-month state legis
lative session in Tallahassee.    

For far too long, big corporate and special interest lobbyists have dominated the halls of our state capitol, while ordinary working people across the state have been virtually shut out of the political process.

Our new people’s center will provide a gathering place for those citizens who want to come to Tallahassee to let their voices be heard but were never able to afford the transportation, housing and other costly expenses.

Can you click here to pitch in now and help us raise the resources necessary to answer Senator Bernie Sanders’ call to action and ensure that workers’ voices are heard loud and clear during the Florida State Legislative session?

Given what is happening at the national level, there is also a lot at stake right here in the Sunshine State. Besides being a right-to-work-for-less state, we are facing an anti-worker Governor, a Republican-controlled legislature and special interest lobbyists backed by the billionaire Koch brothers with a regressive and dangerous agenda: to replace and privatize public schools with charter schools; to cut access to affordable healthcare for millions of Floridians by pushing for Medicaid block-grant funding; to cut taxes for the wealthy at the expense of social services programs; and to even slash funding for our environmental protections.   

The center, on Martin Luther King Blvd in Tallahassee. just one mile from the Capitol, will also offer training sessions by a team of seasoned advocates on economic and social justice issues to help assist those who are new to the legislative process. These will range from Navigating the Capitol to daily topical workshops and preparing workers to testify before committee hearings. Activists will be able to get up-to-the minute updates on critical issues of concern.     

Progress For All is also coordinating with other progressive groups across the state to provide transportation to and from our state capitol as well as food for the activists and their families as they participate in this much-needed civic engagement program.  

At Progress For All we believe that establishing a strong on-going presence of workers and their families front and center in the state capitol will have a tremendous impact on how lawmakers decide which good bills get passed and which bad bills don’t.

Can you donate $15 to help us mobilize for our on-going project to ensure that hard-working Floridians are not left behind, and that they can have a strong influence on the laws that affect them and their families?

In addition to organizing daily actions in Tallahassee, Progress for All, as a member of the Floridians Against Fracking Statewide Coalition, is joining with Rethink Energy Florida, the Sierra Club, Environmental Florida, Food and Water Watch-Florida and a host of other groups to mobilize thousands of activists to converge on the state capital on Wednesday, March 22 for a day of environmental action.

We will be meeting with our legislators and demanding they support renewable energy by implementing Amendment 4 – a constitutional amendment passed last year to allow for property tax breaks for people who install solar panels on their homes; stopping construction of the Sabal Trail “Sinkhole” Pipeline; protecting our fresh drinking water supply known as the Floridan Aquifer – which provides 60% of the state’s drinking water; and calling on them to support a bipartisan ban on fracking bill (H.B. 451/S.B. 442).   

The Florida State Legislature kicked off their session March 7, and we know that our new project of building and supporting massive action will not go unnoticed by Florida Governor Rick Scott, nor by our state legislators. This legislative session will NOT be business as usual!