Dear friends,
As a meditation teacher once helpfully explained to me, the mind moves in waves, crossing and recrossing the object of its attention as it reorients from distractions and digressions. So, there’s no judgment if your mind wanders off, because that what minds do. The secret, is to tighten your wiggle so that you’re focused enough of the time.
Thursday is our day for refreshing our focus on some actions that matter; get ready to tighten your wiggle.
The Biden Administration has extended the student loan payment pause through the summer, hopefully in preparation for bigger action before the fall midterms. Protesters gathered in DC this week to share their debt stories and to urge the president to “pick up the pen” to cancel student debt.
Send a letter to the President calling for the cancellation of student debt. This ready-made action from Moms Rising will take just 15 seconds!
Scientists are not ready to accept ‘doomism’ —
‘I don’t have to go to the effort of making changes because there’s nothing I can do anyway.’
and are instead trying to figure out how to
switch [everyone] into climate emergency mode and end fossil fuels in just a few years.
Contact the President today to let him know that we need meaningful climate action now. The action is ready-made and will take less than a minute.
We have to whack this mole again: one month from today, the New York Department of Environmental Conservational (DEC) will decide whether or not to allow National Grid to build two new fracked gas vaporizers at its facility in Greenpoint.
Tell Governor Hochul and the DEC: Don’t Vaporize Brooklyn! This ready-made 15-second (!) action is from NoNBKPipeline.
As members of the public, we are shaping the proposed scoping plan from New York State’s Climate Action Plan. NY Renews has created a new comment on industry, including calls for energy efficiency, waste reduction, and a moratorium on "proof of work" cryptocurrency mining. Raise your voice!
Submit a comment calling for a plan for industry to focus on climate and environmental justice. This 15-second (!) action is from NY Renews.
The Speaker of the Assembly, Carl Heastie, is standing in the way of the All-Electric Building Act. He needs to hear from all of us. Let him know that New York must meet its climate goals, including
"an 85% emissions reduction by 2050 and 40% in emissions reductions by 2030."
This is also a public health move that will improve air quality.
Call Assemblyman Heastie today at 518-455-3791 to let him know that you support the All-Electric Building Act.
We’ve got a pile of New York actions, because the budget is not yet made.
The housing crisis has been getting a lot of attention, but not enough appropriate action. Clearing away the belongings of unhoused people is not going to solve the problem, but investments in social housing might help.
the Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act, which would give renters a new right to make the first offer and give first refusal when buildings go up for sale.
"Without the expansion of tenants rights that TOPA provides, many low-income New Yorkers will continue to fall victim to unscrupulous landlords and predatory real estate investors," the advocates wrote in the letter.
Contact your state delegation to call for $50 million for community land trusts, passage of TOPA, and $1 billion for TOPA purchases. This ready-made quick action is from the Upstate/Downstate Housing Alliance.
The Caring Majority delegation in Albany has again called for reinforcements because we have not given up on winning Fair Pay for Home Care.
Call the governor (again!) at 1-518-474-8390; press 3 and then 2 to speak to a person. Tell the staffer we can’t afford not to fund Fair Pay for Home Care. Please call and make them listen to reason.
The governor’s regrettable 10-point plan for public safety would reverse essential reforms, including: raise the age, which prevented youth and children from being sent to adult prisons; bail reform, which prevents biased jailing of low income and poor communities awaiting their day in court; and a number of essential protections within our legal system, including discovery rules which would would allow cops to hide evidence, including exculpatory evidence.
Tell your legislators to reject Hochul’s regressive 10-point plan! This ready-made, 15-second (!) action is from Moms Rising.
Thanks for taking action!
with love,
L