Urge your Legislators to vote "No" on bad water and utility bills

Since most of the bad bills have already gone through committee (except for those in appropriations), this week we are recommending that you weigh in on one bill on the Request to Speak system. Please, weigh in before it is heard at 10am on Monday.  HB2606 appropriation; local border support (Nguyen: Bliss, Kolodin) appropriates $50 million for targeting people at the border, border enforcement actions. OPPOSE Please, take a few minutes to sign the Sierra Club's petition (below) on the bad water bills: HB2087 and HB2606. Also, the bad energy bills: HB2201 and HB2679 We are including the Sierra Club's legislative update to keep you informed: This week was the last week for each House to hear bills in committee in the house of origin, so House bills had to be heard in House committees and Senate bills had to be heard in Senate committees. The only exception is the Appropriations Committee, which is why it is the only committee meeting next week. The agendas were extremely full of bad legislation to weaken water laws and hinder voting, plus measures to punish immigrants and block diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). We even saw a bill that combines utility competition bill that punishes utilities that have any DEI policies and that have any Zero Carbon goals. Phew! That is a serious load of lousy legislation. On a positive note, we saw the big monopoly electric utilities get their hats handed to them on the Floor of the House as one of their key bills, HB2201, went down to defeat, and their other top bill get amended and held in Committee of the Whole. They will be back, but it was nice to see lawmakers reject these bad policies -- and it was bi-partisan. On Monday, HB2201 will be back for further amendment. We shall see how that plays out, but please keep those emails coming and take action below. Another plus this week was Governor Hobbs's veto of HB2703, a bill that would have further limited early voting by moving up the ballot return deadline and also making it easier to remove people from the Active Early Voting List. Please thank Governor Hobbs for the veto if you have not done so already. You can send a quick note to her here. Next week, legislators will mostly be voting on bills on the floor of the House and Senate and moving a lot of these bad bills across to the other house. Take action and stay tuned. Make a call or send an email or both.  Don't forget to support or oppose bills in the Request to Speak system. If you have not created an account on the Request to Speak system, I encourage you to do so.  Please sign in to RTS and oppose the following bills: HB2087 and HB2606. To see the bills we are tracking, please go here. Please use the Sierra Club petition to keep up the pressure on legislators and ask them to oppose HB2201 and HB2679, bills that would relieve electric utilities of responsibility for wild fires caused by their infrastructure and would allow them to issue bonds to pay for debt in assets without proper accountability, oversight, or consumer protection, and could shift major costs to future ratepayers.     Take Action - Hold Utilities Accountable! Protect Arizona's Waters, Oppose SB1520 and SB1611  It is absolutely unconscionable that the Arizona Legislature continues to do nothing significant to address rural water issues and also continues to weaken and poke more holes in the Groundwater Management Act. This week we are focusing on a couple of the really bad ones, including one that will allow more development where water is not physically available and one that codifies over pumping of groundwater in rural basins. Please take action below and send a message to your Senator to protect Arizona water and to vote NO on SB1520 and SB1611. https://act.sierraclub.org/actions/Arizona?actionId=AR0523085 All the best,   Sandy Bahr Chapter Director Sierra Club - Grand Canyon Chapter

Weigh in on the Request to Speak system before this bill is heard in committee Monday:  Sign into the Request to Speak here: https://apps.azleg.gov/account/signon If you haven't signed up for the system, you can find the form here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScdjBMoAJrjHD57GGegmdUCKAowcr93K4vQA6a7_AjyElBtrQ/viewform Directions on how to navigate the system: https://desktopactivisttucson.blogspot.com/2018/03/request-to-speak-time.html Monday, February 24th House Appropriations Committee at 10:00 AM Members of the public may attend in person or access a livestream of the meeting here. HB2606 appropriation; local border support (Nguyen: Bliss, Kolodin) appropriates $50 million for targeting people at the border, border enforcement actions. OPPOSE Most of the rest of the week will be focused on Floor actions.