Request to Speak actions for week of March 2nd... and one last chance to contact your legislators on bad energy bill (HCR 2050)

Environmental actions on the ballot?! 

If you have been keeping up with our Request to Speak actions, you should have already weighed in on most of the bills that are now being heard in the other house. So, our list is shorter this week. (See RTS actions below). If you haven’t, you can find previous RTS actions on the Desktop Activist Tucson website and still weigh in on them.  

This week I have included some bad voting bills because it makes it difficult to advocate for the environment if we can’t vote.

Unfortunately, HCR 2050 made it through committee and awaits a Third Read vote in the house. If it passes it will put this horrific bill on the ballot. Governor Hobbs won't be able to veto it!  If you haven't already, please, reach out to your legislators using the Sierra Club’s petition (link below).

 

HCR2050 energy source; restriction; prohibition (Griffin: Biasiucci, Bliss, et al) would put on the ballot a proposed constitutional amendment to prohibit a city, town, county or any other political subdivision of the state from restricting the manufacture, use or sale of a device based on the energy source that is either used to power the device or consumed by the device. Device is not defined, but this is clearly intended to preclude any limits on fossil fuels, including gas. This will make it harder to protect our air, our water, our health, and our communities.
 

Take action against HCR2050 here.

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Request to Speak on the following bills before they are heard in their respective committees.

Sign onto the RTS app:
https://apps.azleg.gov/account/signon

Review RTS directions:
https://desktopactivisttucson.blogspot.com/2018/03/request-to-speak-time.html

Monday, March 4th

Senate Elections Committee at 2:00 PM

• HB2404 voter registration cards; mailing limitation (Gillette: Biasiucci, Bliss, et al) prohibits the county recorder from providing an initial or updated voter registration card to a person whose mailing address is outside of Arizona except for active military members and those for whom there is no Arizona mail address. This would exclude students. OPPOSE
• HB2482 voter registration changes; text notice  (Parker B) requires county recorders to notify people either via text or in writing if they make any changes to their voting records and provide them with information on how they can check their record and make any changes needed. This is a good transparency measure and a service to voters. SUPPORT
• HB2852 voter registrations; organizations; prohibition (Heap: Chaplik, Gillette, et al) prohibits the  state and any city, town, county or political subdivision from participating as a member of the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC). The state can’t provide information to ERIC (a trusted non-profit organization that makes sure people don’t register to vote in more than one state). Instead, they must hire a third-party contractor. OPPOSE

Senate Finance and Commerce Committee at 2:00PM

• HB2007 subdivided lands; civil penalties (Griffin) says a civil penalty for a subdivider or agent who engages in unlawful practice with respect to the sale or lease of subdivided lands applies to each lot where a violation occurs rather than all of the lots combined. This is positive because it increases the penalty for unscrupulous developers. SUPPORT

House Municipal Affairs and Public Safety at 2:00 PM

• SCR1042 support; Texas; southern border (Bolick: Bennett, Borrelli, et al) supports Texas's unlawful and harmful activities along its border with Mexico that have resulted in the deaths of immigrants. OPPOSE

Urge your legislators to vote NO on bills that attack environmental actions, water protections and a few innocent bystanders

Brace yourself. There are so many bad bills advancing at our state legislature that I am including the Sierra Club's recommended actions in this post. Next week, the House will start hearing Senate bills and the Senate will start hearing House bills. They will continue to vote on the hundreds of bills on the Floor of each house, too.  No new Request to Speak actions this week - if you've been keeping up.  If you haven't, please, check last week's post for the bill numbers.  See the Call-in and Petition actions from the Sierra Club below...  The "Billapalooza" of bad policy advanced an incredible number of bad bills on multiple levels, including racist measures, prohibitions and preemptions on climate action, anti-democracy bills, and a plethora of harmful water bills. In addition to all of that, they advanced the bills to try and remove protections from public lands and objected to sustainability goals such as ending poverty.  HB2788 United Nations; sustainable development; prohibition (Jones: Biasiucci, Bliss, et al.) prohibiting Arizona or any of its political subdivisions from adopting the sustainable development agenda of the United Nations, which means they are objecting to support for ending poverty, support for achieving food security, ensuring healthy lives, achieving gender equality, and protecting the planet and our ability to live on it by objecting to action on climate change and promoting water sustainability. Passed House Committee of the Whole (COW) and awaits a Third Read vote. HCR2040 public monies; prohibited expenditures (Smith: Biasiucci, Carbone, et al.) was amended in House COW to add a prohibition on the floor to add prohibitions on any kind of affirmative action in hiring. HCR2040 refers to the ballot a measure to prohibit the state or any political subdivision, including universities, to do anything to help reduce global temperatures, have a climate action plan, participate in anything related to reducing meat consumption, etc. It wraps this up with a bow related to prohibiting "furthering Marxist ideologies." It is clearly intended to connect all of these issues and motivate voters who fear that there is a vast conspiracy to make this a better world. It awaits a Third Read vote.  Two comparable measures, SCR1015 and SB1195 are on the Senate COW calendar for Monday.  Call your representatives and ask them to oppose HB2788 and HCR2040 and call your Senators and ask them to oppose SCR1015 and SB1195.   Speaker Toma's anti-immigrant measure, HCR2060, which expands the provisions of the horribly racist SB1070, passed out of the House along party lines. You can read more about it here. It sure would be nice if some of those businesses would speak out against this. Please also ask your representatives to vote no on HCR2050 energy source; restriction; prohibition (Griffin: Biasiucci, Bliss, et al). It refers to the ballot a proposed constitutional amendment to prohibit a city, town, county or any other political subdivision of the state from restricting the manufacture, use or sale of a device based on the energy source that is either used to power the device or consumed by the device. Device is not defined, but this is clearly intended to preclude any limits on fossil fuels, including gas. This will make it harder to protect our air, our water, our health, and our communities. Thank you to Representative Oscar de los Santos for speaking up against this bad policy. You can hear his remarks and the ridiculous response to them here.    Take action against HCR2050 here. You can find contact information for all legislators here.

Protect Public Lands and Waters

https://act.sierraclub.org/actions/Arizona?actionId=AR0421094

The Arizona Legislature is again launching an attack on public lands and waters via a series of bills and memorials (messages to Congress and the President) asking that no more lands or waters be protected and that current protections be rescinded, and seeking to require legislative permission to protect any additional federal public land. Please send a message to your Arizona Representatives asking them to vote NO on all of these bills! The Arizona Legislature also has a large number of bills that weaken water protections. Please send your representatives a message to oppose bills that create more loopholes and that allow for more pumping of precious groundwater. Ask your representatives to vote NO on harmful water bills.