PNN’s mission is to engage, educate and empower our neighbors to make our City a better place to live. Here’s what’s coming up in each of these areas:
Engage: Collect Petition Signatures for Our Endorsed Candidates; Say No to Bomb Trains
Educate: Workshop on How Harrisburg Works; Testify Against Medicare Fraud
Empower: City Council Candidates Forum; Students as Poll Workers
Join Our Saturday Petition Drive for Our Endorsed Candidates
TOMORROW, Saturday, March 4th, 11AM, Lovett Library, 6945 Germantown Ave
Join us tomorrow for a last-push petition drive to help our endorsed at-large candidates - Rue Landau, Erika Almiron, Katherine Gilmore-Richardson, Amanda McIllmurray and Isiah Thomas - get on the ballot. We are also working to get signatures for 8th District candidate Seth Anderson-Oberman and mayoral candidate Helen Gym.
As you know, petition signatures are regularly challenged by competitors in the hope that they can keep a candidate off the ballot in May, so candidates try to get significantly more signatures than needed.
Saturday promises to be a nice day, so please let us know you can join us by clicking the link below.
___________________________________________________________________________________________
Workshop: Want to Know How Harrisburg Works?
Wednesday, March 15th, 7PM, Virtual
Ever wonder how the folks who make our laws in Harrisburg operate on a daily basis? How they come to their decisions, who influences them (and why), and how we can fight back against the rampant corruption that seems to have infected our state capital? Want to find out how the newly-configured state house can be influenced by progressives?
Then you want to come to this joint training by Philly Neighborhood Networks and March on Harrisburg founder Rabbi Michael Pollack. This year, we’ll be working with our friends at March on Harrisburg to hold our new state government to account. We’re going to work to pass a Gift Ban to stop lobbyists from providing graft to legislators, and to support Ranked Choice Voting, among other priorities.
If you want to know more, then join us on March 15th for this informative workshop.
___________________________________________________________________________________________
City Council Candidates Forum
Sunday, March 26th, 3PM, Congregation Rodeph Shalom, 615 N. Broad Street
The Alliance for Just Philadelphia will conduct its second City Council Candidates Forum focusing on the many candidates who have thrown their hats in the ring to become an At-Large Councilmember.
You may recall that the first Forum in 2019 drew more than 1,000 residents at Congregation Rodeph Shalom to hear the candidates speak on a variety of important local issues. We anticipate another large turnout of both candidates (nearly 30 showed up the first time!) and Philly activists.
Let us know that you'll be joining us by clicking on the link below.
___________________________________________________________________________________________
Say No To Bomb Trains
Sign Petition
The Environment Action Committee asks you to Say No to Bomb Trains by signing your name on a petition that insists on the denial of special permits for the rail transport of liquified natural gas (LNG).
Set to roll through Philadelphia, Scranton, Allentown, Camden and other communities on its way to Gibbstown, NJ for export, these types of train cars, more than 50 years old and not designed to withstand the flammability of the cargo, are currently operating under Trump’s 2020 federal rule overturning a long-standing ban.
The ban on the transport of LNG by rail must be reinstated. The recent disaster in East Palestine, OH is a vivid illustration of how our deteriorated rail infrastructure and lack of regulations puts us all at risk for inevitable disaster. The link to the petition is below.
___________________________________________________________________________________________
Tell Students: Get Paid to Be a Poll Worker!
The City of Philadelphia wants students to become poll workers for the upcoming May Primary Election and they are willing to pay for it. The City Commissioners' Office has just released a great new online application for their "Involved at 17" student poll worker and bilingual interpreter program. The program is a great way for students to take part in an authentic civic learning experience that fulfills an important need on Election Day, and students will get paid $250 or more!
___________________________________________________________________________________________
Sick of Medicare Advantage Misdeeds? Then Testify
Public Comment Due by March 6th
Recently, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) proposed new rules that would begin to rein in the massive misdeeds that have come to define the Medicare Advantage (MA) program. The agency is currently accepting public comment on these new policies, so here is your opportunity to make your voice heard.
Visit regulations.gov, enter the docket number “CMS-2023-0010” in the “Search” field, and follow the instructions for “Submitting a comment.”
Want to do more? Then join our Healthcare Action Committee on Wednesday, March 8th to talk about what we can do to fix our broken healthcare system.
___________________________________________________________________________________________
This Week in History
Mar 4, 1933 – FDR's New Deal. On this day, Franklin Delano Roosevelt introduced his "New Deal" for economically battered Americans at his inauguration as 32nd President, where he proclaimed, "We have nothing to fear but fear itself".
Mar 7, 1965 – "Bloody Sunday." John Lewis was among 600 marchers who were assaulted by state troopers and local police as they crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge outside Selma, to prevent them from reaching the Alabama state capital.
Mar 9, 1841 – Amistad Ruling. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the enslaved Africans who seized control of the Amistad slave ship had been illegally forced into slavery, and thus were free under American law.
Thanks for your activism!
Tim Brown, Organizing Director