Domestic Weekly Update June 8, 2010
New and Urgent in This Week’s Update
Latest from Washington, DC
Organizational Updates
Join the RESULTS National Conference Call THIS Saturday with Special Guest Congresswoman Mary Jo Kilroy (12:30 p.m. ET)Join the RESULTS’ June domestic monthly conference call this Saturday, June 12, at 12:30 pm ET. We are delighted to have as our guest this month Congresswoman Mary Jo Kilroy (D-OH-15). We will discuss our Economic Opportunity campaign with Rep. Kilroy, including the current status of preserving the 2009 expansions of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and Child Tax Credit (CTC). She will also discuss how we can best influence members of Congress on these issues. This will be invaluable information as we meet with our members of Congress this month, both at the RESULTS International Conference and back home, as part of our June Action. We are sincerely thankful to Congresswoman Kilroy for taking the time to appear on this month’s call. TAKE ACTION: Coordinate and gather with your group this Saturday, June 12, for the national conference call at 12:30 p.m. ET. The call-in number is (888) 409-6709. Once connected to the operator, ask for the RESULTS National Conference call. Plan to call in no later than 12:27 p.m. ET to give time to the operator to connect you with the call. Setting Up Face-to-Face Meetings to Talk about Economic Opportunity for All (June Action)Last week, members of RESULTS’ Domestic Team held a workshop on low-income tax credits at the Bonner Summer Leadership Institute in Kentucky, an annual summer conference for college students from around the country who are committed to public service. After hearing about the unparalleled effect that low-income tax credits have on reducing poverty in the U.S., the students became extremely excited and jumped at the opportunity to influence policy and create continued economic relief for low-income Americans. Realizing the most effective way to get their message across as citizens is via direct communication with their congress person, several of them looked up their elected officials and began writing letters then and there. With this simple act, these passionate and energetic young men and women joined the larger movement you all have perfected — a movement built around the idea that democracy does not work without citizen involvement. This month, we are using our grassroots training and experience to maximize our citizen involvement by setting up face-to-face meetings with members of Congress. Meeting face-to-face with members of Congress is key to developing the relationships we need to influence policy. This type of grassroots action is what makes RESULTS unique in its advocacy. No other organization pushes its grassroots to regularly meet with members of Congress like RESULTS. We do this not only because for that moment, your work puts our issues at the top of the legislative agenda. We also urge you to set up these meetings because we know you are the best grassroots advocates out there working on behalf of people living in poverty. If you are attending the RESULTS International Conference in Washington, DC, June 20—22, please make sure to schedule face-to-face meetings with members of Congress during the conference (Lobby Day is June 22). If you are not attending the conference, request a face-to-face meeting with your representative and senators when they are back at home. Many members of Congress travel back to their home states on weekends. Also, Congress will be on recess July 5–9 for the July 4 recess. In your meetings, put to good use the information you have learned over the last few months about the importance of tax policy in combating poverty. In particular, use the local data and stories from your VITA Outreach in May to back up your policy requests. TAKE ACTION: Tax the June Action. Contact your local offices for your representatives and senators to set up a face-to-face meeting to discuss low-income tax credits, at the International Conference and during their next visit back to your home state. Don’t be afraid to be persistent about getting a meeting; sometimes it takes several requests to get a face-to-face meeting at home. Also, our Domestic Legislative Packet will be available tomorrow. This handbook is created each year for the International Conference, but can be used for meetings in DC or back home. You can download it from our International Conference page. Also, ask your local MoC office if your members of Congress will be making any public appearances near you this week (and this summer) and plan to attend to ask a question. You can find local contact information for members of Congress on the Elected Officials page of the RESULTS website. Tell the Senate to Pass H.R.4213 with Medicaid Funding for StatesAs reported last week, on May 28, the House passed H.R. 4213, the American Jobs and Closing Tax Loopholes Act of 2010, 215-204. The bill contains some provisions that will help American workers and low-income families make it a few extra months this year, including extending unemployment insurance benefits (UI), the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Emergency Fund, and investing $1 billion in summer jobs for youth. Despite these much-needed extensions, the House’s final bill did not include a critical extension of temporary funding for state Medicaid programs, as well as the additional COBRA subsidy passed in 2009 to help unemployed workers keep their health insurance. The Senate did not take up the bill before leaving for the Memorial Day recess. This lag in time, while disastrous for unemployed workers who lost their UI on June 2, has produced some bright spots. Feeling pressure from grassroots activists like you and governors counting on that additional Medicaid funding, yesterday the Senate released its version of the bill which restores the Medicaid funding dropped from the House bill. If passed, this will stave off enormous cuts to Medicaid and other programs at the state level. Unfortunately, the Senate bill does not restore the enhanced COBRA subsidy that was also dropped by the House. It is imperative that we tell senators to pass this bill with this vital funding. Removal of this Medicaid funding from the bill (as the House did) would be catastrophic to state budgets and affect millions of Medicaid patients and health care workers around the country. TAKE ACTION: Call your senators toll free at (888) 340-6521 and urge them to pass the H.R.4213 as soon as possible, and in particular the extension of Medicaid funding for states. Millions of Americans are counting on the provisions in this bill to help them make it through this tough economy. Furthermore, urge your senators to demand that the Medicaid funding be included in the final version of the bill that will be sent to President Obama for signature. They should also work to revive the COBRA funding that was dropped by the House. You can also use our online alert for your calls. Thanks to AFSCME for providing the toll free number. RESULTS International Conference — We’re Less Than Two Weeks Away!Legislative Handbooks Available Online! To help you prepare for the International Conference, RESULTS creates a legislative packet for volunteers to use at the International Conference. This provides you a complete up-to-date overview of the issues we are highlighting this year and our current requests for members of Congress. You can find downloadable versions of both the Domestic Legislative Handbook (available tomorrow) and the Global Legislative Handbook on our International Conference page. Please be sure to print off the appropriate packet for you (or both, if you like) and bring it to the conference. Continue to Schedule Your Hill Meetings. If you are attending the conference, please make sure to request meetings with your representatives and senators as soon as possible. See our Activist Milestone: Meet Face-to-Face with Your Member of Congress for tips on scheduling and planning your meeting. You can also download and edit this sample letter to send to their office or use our online alert to help set up your meetings. Also, if have not met with Meredith Dodson via phone to discuss your lobby meetings at the conference, please contact her at dodson@results.org to set up a time. Once you schedule your Capitol Hill meetings for the conference, please send the 1) name of member of Congress, 2) if the meeting is a face-to-face, 3) the name of the staffer(s) that will be attending, 4) date, time, location, of the meeting, 5) who from the conference will be attending, 6) if this is a global, domestic, or joint meeting, and 7) cell phone for the key contact person to Lisa Marchal at lmarchal@results.org or call her at (317) 489-9173. Help Send Volunteers to Our Conference. Make a donation today so that financial constraints don’t keep passionate advocates from coming to our conference. You can donate online or mail a check to our DC office (see address at end of this update) to RESULTS Educational Fund. In the comment box on the online form or the memo line of your check, please write “KMcQ Scholarship.” Furthermore, if you cannot donate money but could help by donating frequent flyer miles toward an airline ticket for a volunteer, please contact Girmay Zahilay (gzahilay@results.org). Invite Your Members of Congress to Capitol Hill Receptions. If you have not already, please invite your members of Congress to speak at our Capitol Hill receptions on June 22. The RESULTS website has resources including invitation templates to invite your members of Congress to speak. Attend the Conference. We are less than 2 weeks away for RESULTS’ biggest event of the year, but you can still sign up to attend. Go to our International Conference page for registration information and conference details. Please note that our block of rooms at the Washington Marriott Hotel is now full. Quick NewsChild Nutrition Bill to be Released This Week. House Education and Labor Chairman George Miller (D-CA-7) is expected to release his draft of Child Nutrition Reauthorization tomorrow. It is expected to be a more robust, better funded bill than Senate bill approved by the Agriculture Committee in March. The Senate Ag Committee approved at $4.5 billion increase in child nutrition funding over the next ten years, $5.5 billion less that what the President has requested. We will have more details on the House bill after it is released. Urge your representatives and senators to include the full $10 billion increase (over ten years) for these important anti-hunger programs by taking our online action. House and Senate Negotiators to Finalize Wall Street Reform. Now that Congress is back in session, the House and Senate will begin work on finalizing Wall Street reform this week. The Senate conference committee members were set before the Memorial Day recess, and the House negotiators are expected to be named this week. The big areas of contention are likely to be over derivatives reform (the risky financial products that are seen as the heart of the crisis), how to control the size of big banks (“too big to fail”), and fees paid to banks on credit card/debit card purchases. Congress hopes to have a final bill on the President’s desk by the end of the month. AnnouncementsTake the May Action. If you have not done so, please take the May Action. Contact a VITA site coordinator in your area and see if you can set up a meeting between him/her and your RESULTS group. The information and stories you can learn from these people will be invaluable in your meetings with members of Congress in Washington, DC and back home. Use the National Community Tax Coalition to get connected to a site near you. Also, congratulation the Columbus, OH and San Fernando Valley, CA RESULTS groups for recently meeting with VITA representatives at the local meetings. And congratulations as well to the 26 RESULTS groups who signed the CHN letter that will be sent to congress to advocate for expansion of the EITC and CTC. Listen to Recent Training Calls Online. If you were not able to participate in our recent Lobbying 101 or Researching Your Members of Congress training calls, you can now listen to them on the RESULTS website. These calls are great for anyone traveling to the International Conference this year or if you are preparing for a congressional meeting back home. Just click on the following links to listen: Lobby 101 training call; Researching Your Members of Congress training call. Fundraising Update. We will have more updates on our 2010 Domestic Fundraising Campaign on this Saturday’s national conference call and in the coming weeks after the International Conference. Upcoming Events(Click to see a complete calendar) May 31–June 4: Congressional Memorial Day recess. June 12: RESULTS Domestic National Conference Call, 12:30 p.m. ET with Congresswoman Mary Jo Kilroy. June 20–22: RESULTS/RESULTS Educational Fund International Conference, Washington Marriott Hotel, Washington, DC. July 10: Joint Domestic/Global RESULTS National Conference Call, 2:00 p.m. ET. RESULTS Contact InformationMain Office: (p) (202) 783-7100, (f) (202) 783-2818, 750 First Street NE, Suite 1040, Washington DC 20002. If mailing a donation to our DC office, please address the envelope to the attention of Cynthia Stancil. Domestic Legislative and Grassroots Support Staff: Meredith Dodson, (202) 783-7100, x.116 (dodson@results.org); Jos Linn, (515) 288-3622 (jlinn@results.org). The RESULTS Domestic Update is sent out every Tuesday over e-mail to RESULTS volunteers and allies all over the country. The purpose of these updates is to inform and activate RESULTS activists to take action on our domestic campaigns. |