April blossoms today; last week of the Assembly Session unfolds; the People’s Wave comes to DC in late April and we can all be in on it.

Save the Dates for The People's Wave: People's Action 2019 Convention -- Omni Shoreham Hotel  |  Washington, DC

Sunday, April 28, 2019 at 2:00 PM - Tuesday, April 30, 2019 at 5:00 PM (EDT)

April blossoms today; last week of the Assembly Session unfolds; the People’s Wave comes to DC in late April and we can all be in on it.

Save the Dates for The People's Wave: People's Action 2019 Convention -- Omni Shoreham Hotel  |  Washington, DC

Sunday, April 28, 2019 at 2:00 PM - Tuesday, April 30, 2019 at 5:00 PM (EDT)

Register Here – deadline for registration is April 5; don’t let it slide!

Who to expect:

The People's Wave - People's Action 2019 Convention

THE PEOPLE'S WAVE This April, the 2019 People’s Action Convention will bring together member groups, allies and supporters from across the country for 3 inspired days in our nation's capital.

Registration Deadline is April 5 for this three-day event beginning Sunday, April 28

Our exciting “People’s Wave” program features elected officials and movement leaders, campaign sessions that broaden our knowledge and strategy, skills workshops that arms us with tools to build power at home, and opportunities for people-led caucuses. We will engage in strategic direct actions to elevate our narrative and forward our issues and bring our voice to the Hill for a lobby day. We will launch the 2020 platform and advance our long term agenda.

THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY FINAL WEEK – our tattered $15 minimum wage bill is law, with Hogan’s veto soundly overridden -- though struggle will resume in ensuing sessions to include those left behind and speed up the timetable.

 Bills about jobs and justice, shutting down the school-to-prison pipeline and making Maryland more free and more equal – and healthier -- are still straining to get over the finish line. Our allies at the Maryland Legislative Coalition have some candidates for us to consider, starting today with environmental and health issues. They note, too, that the Clean Energy Jobs Act (CEJA), with $20 million for job creation and training, is still stuck in the Rules Committee.

Our allies at the Job Opportunities Task Force reported late last week on bills they are following – a wide variety of measures that would ease the many pressures that keep people in poverty.

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#ExpulsionWeek will be a series of events and activities from April 1- April 5 that will culminate in the expulsion of Del. Mary Ann Lisanti --  Because Racism has no place in Maryland.

Tonight (Monday, April 1) a news conference will kick off the effort.

Del. Lisanti represents a district with nearly 40% Black Americans in it; it has 65% of all Black Americans in Harford County. And Del. Lisanti admitted to telling a white colleague – in company with a big group of colleagues -- that campaigning in Prince George's County on behalf of another candidate equated to door knocking in a “n----- district.” Now she's trying to claim she is being set up by the same machine that she is a part of. Her GOP-lite policy positions make it clear there is no way based on her misconduct and disorderly behavior that she can represent Harford County or the state in general.

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Progressive Maryland will keep you up on the last-minute wheeling and dealing in Annapolis; watch our blog posts this week as the Session heads for sine die next Monday, April 8.

Follow The Issues – check out our website’s expanded “Our Issues” pages, with separate pages for each of our key five issues: Fight for $Fifteen, Civic Engagement, Fair Elections, Police Reform and Environmental Justicehttps://www.progressivemaryland.org/environmental_justice. Each page offers links to our past explanatory blog posts to deepen understanding of our work and our goals – building power for working people.

And to keep up with our activities and those of our progressive allies, sign up for the emailed Weekly Memo, which includes links and summaries for our most recent blog posts – one-stop shopping for the info and calendar you need to build power and agency with our movement in Maryland’s changing system.

OUR CHAPTERS AROUND THE STATE

Progressive Prince George's

MDOT-SHA recently roused anger in Beltway country by dropping mass transit options from plans for Larry Hogan’s pet project, private toll lanes on I-494 and I-270. See our blog post. The agency has scheduled new informational meetings this spring in Prince George’s (April 11, 23, 27) and Montgomery (April 13, 24 and 25). More on this issue with informational blogs at our Environmental Justice issue page.

 PMD Montgomery

MDOT-SHA recently roused anger in Beltway country by dropping mass transit options from plans for Larry Hogan’s pet project, private toll lanes on I-494 and I-270. See our blog post. The agency has scheduled new informational meetings this spring in Montgomery (April 13, 24 and 25). More on this issue with informational blogs at our Environmental Justice issue page.

 Frederick County Progressives

Take Action Anne Arundel County

Take Action AAC Actions & Events

Action to Support Clean Energy Jobs Act  -- call your state delegate(s) and ask for support of the Senate Bill 516 Clean Energy Jobs Act

    Sample call script. As your constituent, I strongly urge you to support the Clean Energy Jobs Act. Be sure to retain the amendment that removed trash incineration from the renewable standard as passed by Senate in SB 516. The clean energy subsidies I pay for in my utility bill must not support trash incineration which pollutes our air and negatively impacts the health of our communities. These subsidies should only support clean, job-creating wind and solar power.    Find contact info for your state delegate here

Wednesday, April 10 at 7 pm - Monthly Chapter Meeting - Local County Environmental Action      Meeting location -- Edgewater Community Library meeting room

   The state session is almost done. We've had some wins and some bills that need more advocacy. Time to strategize how to take action locally. The local implications of these environmental bills will be discussed and action plans developed on 1-2 environmental issues.

        Green & Healthy Amendment - Gives the rights to individuals to have a clean and healthy environment

        Clean Energy Jobs Act -- Increases renewable portfolio standard to 50% by 2030

        EPS Foam Ban --  Bans the use of polystyrene foam food service containers

        Chlorpyrifos Ban -- Bans the use of pesticide chlorpyrifos

        Conservation Funds Fee in Lieu -- Requires local jurisdictions that collect fees in lieu to plant trees in the same watershed.

        Environmental Report on Violations - Requires local jurisdictions to report environmental violations reported by citizens

        Wireless Facilities - Installation and Regulation -- Streamlines process for telecom to locate small cell wireless facilities

    Have an environmental issue you are working on in your community? Come and share your story.

    What's next after the foam ban -- plastic bags!

    Facebook Event

Progressive Howard County

 Talbot Rising

 Lower Shore Progressive Caucus

Check out the Lower Shore Progressive Caucus’s legislative agenda, including the Trust Act, Fight for $15, Medicare for All, clean air issues and more. Plus an explainer: why ranked choice voting would be good for the Shore.

Also, read the Caucus chair’s take on 2020 candidate mania – plus a recent blog post from the leadership team. Distance can provide perspective, and the chapter chair, recently finishing up a semester abroad, offers homecoming observations on the greening of Germany and how it might apply to our home towns, and a consideration of the need for reparations for slavery. And read Jared Schablein's new blog post about progressive gains on the Shore in Maryland Matters.

PMD Baltimore

EVENTS FROM OUR PROGRESSIVE ALLIES

Fellowship opportunity Friends of the Earth is recruiting applicants in 6 states including Pennsylvania and Maryland for our six month Grassroots Fellowship Program to begin in January 2019. Learn and utilize core organizing skills to take action to protect people and the environment. Focus is on training members of under-represented communities.  $2,000 monthly stipend with a commitment of 25 hours a week -- how to apply: https://foe.org/jobs/2019-grassroots-fellowship-program/

Thursday, April 4 – PROGRESSIVE CHEVERLY FORUM 7:00 pm Hoyer Education Center (cafeteria) 2300 Belleview Ave. Cheverly

Please join us for our April forum as we explore policing, race, and community. Dr. Sharita Jacobs Thompson will discuss the historical context of the intersection of race and policing, and share the innovative training she has helped develop in Washington DC involving the National Museum of African American History and Culture (in which Cheverly's police force recently participated). We will also hear from a team of researchers at UMD's Applied Social Science Research Lab about work they are doing around implicit bias and police training. There will be ample time for questions and answers and we hope that anyone interested in these topics will join us for a robust discussion.

All are welcome. Light refreshments will be served

SAT April 13 Prince George’s NAMI National Alliance on Mental Illness mental health support groups 10:30 AM-12 noon at Interdynamics, Inc 4601 Forbes Blvd. Suite 100 Lanham, MD 20706. Do you or a loved one struggle with a mental health condition such as depression or anxiety? Come Share With Others Who Have Similar Experiences! Also May 11 and June 8 – every second Saturday. Info at www.namipgc.org

 Baltimore progressives, Check in on Max Obuszewski’s highly useful activist calendar and tip sheet at http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/

 Reading the Progressive Maryland BlogSpace: our blogs for the previous weeks are shown below, but if you want a handy way to keep track – and never miss a blog post – you can sign up to get this Weekly Memo by email. Remember this is your blogspace and your participation is heartily invited. See something going on that you don’t like – or that you do like and hope to see more of? Send us your thoughts; submit to the moderator at [email protected]

We recently published these blogs:

March 28, 2019 Protect consumers against Trump administration rollbacks of loan regulations

The Trump administration is pushing a plan to remove consumer protections against predatory payday lending. You can push back and keep discriminatory, predatory lending out of our communities. Public comments on this pro-bank, pro-corporate and anti-working families rollback are open here. Read on and find out how to fight back.

March 27, 2019 Tell your Assembly members -- override the veto of the $15 minimum wage

GOV. LARRY HOGAN HAS VETOED THE $15 MINIMUM WAGE BILL that was passed last week by the Maryland General Assembly. Maryland’s hard-working families need this bill. Contact your legislators before the vote to override, which will probably be tomorrow. Let them know that this hard-fought bill deserves passage this year.

And sign our petition to make sure the public as well as legislators understand the importance of this new timetable for making sure the state minimum wage keeps up with the cost of leaving – instead of leaving the state’s working people behind, as the governor’s veto would do.

March 27, 2019 Port Towns victory shows progressive activism works

Grassroots action works. It takes perseverance and patience, but it works.

 Activists and allies in the Port Towns surrounding historic Bladensburg, on the Anacostia in Prince George’s County, have fought for almost two years against a proposed “concrete batching plant” endangering residential areas and community health. They won. See how they did it here.

March 26, 2019 Progressive leadership on Lower Shore has shown what works

Progressive leadership and a commitment to the public good works everywhere in Maryland -- from urban centers to the Lower Shore. Progressive Maryland activist Jared Schablein, in an op-ed in Maryland Matters, shows how this has happened in Salisbury.

March 25, 2019 Progressive Maryland Weekly Memo for Monday, March 25, 2019

Sine die approaches but progressive power-building never sleeps. Check out our online resources and lots right here on the Weekly Memo, including pushback against 5G radiation in our communities and the growth of progressive sentiment on the Lower Shore.

First, check out our Late Breaking IN-vite to the People's Wave.

>>REMEMBER – these blog posts are expressions of political opinion from our wide-ranging membership and circle of allies. They are not expressions of opinion by Progressive Maryland. Don’t be surprised if they sometimes vary in their political content. You might even disagree with them – a good reason to contribute a blog of your own. Send it to the moderator, Woody Woodruff, at [email protected].

>>Keeping up with the blogs is easier with the index. The blogs published in the PM BlogSpace from June 2015 through December 2016 are all available with descriptions and links here. You can follow blogs for 2017-18 starting from here