lobby visits in D.C. January 29
PANYS nyc
As you may know, United for Peace and Justice has called for a lobby
training and lobby day to coincide with the march in D.C. on January
27. Saturday is the march, Sunday is a lobby training and networking
day and Monday we all visit our congress people and senators. Peace
Action of New York State is coordinating the New York State visits for
the lobby day. You may have gotten a phone call from us in the last
few weeks if you have participated in a lobby day in the past.
We want to aim for lobby visits in all of New York's 29 congressional
districts. If you plan to come for the march, please consider staying
through part of Monday to lobby your representative and senators. We
need to capitalize on the country's anti-war sentiment and turn it
into results. The only way we can do that is through consistent,
organized pressure to cut funding for the war and focus on a safe
withdrawal of troops and rebuilding Iraq. Lobby visits are an
excellent way to apply this consistent, organized pressure. If you
cannot come to D.C. but want to do a lobby visit in New York, let us
know. We will try to also set up local visits if enough people are
interested.
To make scheduling the congressional visits more efficient we would
like to make the appointments from here in the office instead of having
someone from each district take care of making the appointments. We
will need to make the appointment in the name of someone who lives in
that congressional district. Having an appointment made in your name
just means that you will need to be on the visit - you have no other
particular obligations.
If you are willing to have the visit made in your name, please reply to
this e-mail with your name, contact info (in case the congressional
office asks), and which representative you plan to visit.
If you have not contacted us about wanting to attend the lobby day in
D.C. and want to, please send us an e-mail so we can add you to the
list. When we begin to set up the actual visits we will need to
provide lists of all people attending to some offices.
I have attached a lodging list that you can use to make arrangements.
Accomodations are filling quickly so it is best to call soon. A number
of the less expensive options offer rooms for from two to five people
so if you are thinking of attending with friends, this may be the best
option to consider.
The UFPJ buses leaving from NYC will be returning on January 27.
People who wish to stay for the lobby training and the lobby day will
need to arrange separate transportation. There are a number of
inexpensive buses that go to D.C. from Chinatown. You can check
schedules and fares here:
http://www.chinatown-bus.com/
http://www.2000coach.com/
http://www.gotobus.com/
You can also take the train. Amtrak one way is about $67 and round
trip is about $134 www.amtrak.com
***If you belong to a group with multiple members planning to attend,
please let us know how many of your members are planning to attend the
lobby day and what districts you will visit. If you have any
questions, please let us know.***
PANYS plans to make these visits in January just the start. We want to
coordinate visits every three months so that we can carefully monitor
and continually check in with our representatives on their progress (or
lack of) on working to end the war. We hope you come to this first
visit and will participate in subsequent visits.
Thanks,
Melissa Van
Executive Director
Peace Action of New York State
mel...@panys.org
646-723-1749
**become a member of Peace Action New York State today!
http://www.peaceactionnewyorkstate.org/signup.shtml