Happy March and Womxn’s History Month! 

We are now at the halfway point of the legislative session and some crucial bills still need action. See below for policy updates and action items, especially on law enforcement reform and ending medical debt. This and much more in the Memo.

Thank you for being part of this movement. In Solidarity, The PM Team

The impact of a cluster of polluting fossil fuel power plants on children and neighborhoods has sparked bills in this Assembly session in response. A Maryland Matters report and independent research provided to the Progressive Maryland BlogSpace fleshes out this instance in which environmental racism and profit are causing officials to look the other way.

Efforts to bring environmental justice to impacted communities -- such as Brandywine in Prince George's County, where Black communities have several polluting power plants placed or scheduled in their immediate neighborhood -- are emerging in the Assembly session. That includes significant upgrading of a commission on environmental justice that has lapsed into near-inactivity, lawmakers note. Maryland Matters recounts the state of play.

Lots going on as the Maryland General Assembly approaches the halfway point, but especially struggles over better public control of law enforcement and its disparate impact on working families and communities of color, on the streets and in schools. We have statewide news on COVID safety and relief, too, as well as national updates on how to bring relief faster and confirm competent cabinet leaders. This and much more in the Memo.

Thank you for being part of this movement. 

Welcome to our Tuesday post-holiday Weekly Memo.

Both chambers of the General Assembly have overridden Gov. Hogan’s vetoes of the bills enabling and funding the rescue of our state education effort (the Kirwan plan). Our schools are fighting the triple crisis (COVID, economy, historically inadequate school funding) and Gov. Hogan’s 2020 veto as the pandemic’s grip tightened was a major setback.

As Black History Month continues, we are continuing to put Black futures at the forefront to affirm, celebrate, and defend all Black lives. See below for information on various events this month to educate yourself and support Black communities. 

This and much more in the Memo.

It’s Impeachment Week in the halls of Congress! And it’s Veto Week in Annapolis! Trump faces a reckoning, piloted by lead impeachment manager Jamie Raskin of MoCo, and Hogan faces veto overrides in the General Assembly to get moving on rescuing our state education effort in the way the triple crisis (COVID, economy, historically inadequate school funding) demands. This and much more in the Memo.

What is crushing our communities during the COVID emergency? In many ways, they are the same social factors that keep our vulnerable communities under stress at most times – but the COVID crisis has cruelly e021xposed those factors. Hogan's "State of the State 2o21" chatfest dodged big issues and made current miseries sound like our fault, not his. But there are paths we can take that will get us out.

Marylanders across the progressive spectrum know: Corporate politicians and billionaires getting rich during the pandemic may not understand that folks are suffering, but everyday people do. We need a real COVID relief plan, not a watered-down bill to make Mitch McConnell happy.

Congress is shaping the next COVID-19 bill this week, but it’s clear that some politicians and their billionaire backers either don’t understand or don’t care what’s happening across the country. Time for all of us to remind them who they are working for.

Greetings to Progressive Maryland activists and supporters who are new to the Weekly Memo!

Most Mondays, the Memo sums up the news you can use throughout Maryland, focusing on Progressive Maryland’s multi-issue scope growing electoral and civil power in tandem. Events across the state and across the progressive action landscape are right at your hand here, and the thoughts and actions of those fighting for working families are embodied in our blog posts. Get what you need here.

Your activist calendar for the week, plus info on health, politics and... well, the crossroads where they meet, which is our whole lives right now.

Start with Progressive Maryland's Environmental Task Force meeting in just a few -- 5pm to 6pm TODAY, Monday Jan. 25. See the Memo about that and more.

On yesterday's holiday (hard-won!) to honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. we recall his iconic Riverside Church address of 1967, enumerating the injustices at home and globally of which the then-raging Vietnam War was an illustration. These familiar echoes of today remind us what a visionary King was and, 53 years after his death, remains. See links to that address below.

In the Memo: Details on the Assembly’s first week, including veto overrides; two issue task forces this week -- sign up; our COVID-19 report, state and national, including the Biden-Harris vaccine recovery plan post-Trump; our chapters around the state; allies’ actions, and recent blog posts. Read on; it’s your weekly road map to building power.

Does the Maryland General Assembly, opening today, have the resilience to do the people’s business in a worsening pandemic, under unprecedented conditions and rules for both legislators and members of the public -- who want them to attend to the emergency we have now? And who want them to be open about what they are accomplishing, or not accomplishing? See what a People's Recovery Agenda must include and how we will fight for it.

STATEWIDE ANNUAL MEMBER ASSEMBLY 

Larry Stafford, Progressive Maryland’s Executive Director, described our first ever virtual Membership Assembly (MA) a huge success. We brought together more than 140 concerned community activists from all over Maryland on Saturday, January 9. In a week where we saw historic election victories by Rev. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff in the Georgia U.S. Senate run-offs, we also witnessed a violent white supremacist mob attack at the US Capitol. Aware of the turbulent times we’re in and the problems we face as a state and country the MA participants recommitted to the goal of advancing progressive values and voices in the legislative and electoral arenas. Our broad based community will push back against the right wing attack on democracy and against their rhetoric and deplorable actions, and will build a base of progressive voters and volunteers in the coming days and months to help us gain more seats for progressives at the local, state, and federal level. 

We came away from the meeting with a newly elected Board of Directors, an increased number of dues paying members, and additional volunteer leaders all of whom will help us realize our bold vision for 2021 and 2022. See more about what we did in the Memo, below, including links to our agendas for 2021.

Repairing the damage to learning brought by the pandemic, a veteran Maryland education official argues, "legislators should be guided by two basic rules. One is to follow the science. The other is to have the resolve to make tough, triage-like policy choices. Applied to relief for learning loss, research leaves little doubt that the highest return on investment would be tutoring in grades K-3 in reading. Students who fail to gain a foothold on early literacy skills never catch up academically; a shocking percentage of them become drop-outs, impoverished and too often imprisoned. Research also teaches that tutoring in the early grades will be most effective during regular school hours by paid, well-trained tutors and integrated into a school’s framework of tiered interventions for struggling readers." Given the inevitable shortfall in finances, "legislators must resist intense political pressure to simply spread the learning loss money among many competing relief proposals," and focus on what research shows would be the highest-return policy.

January 4, 2021 -- Yes, 2021, not a typo (or maybe the 4th of January NOT2020 if you prefer). It’s only a flip of the calendar page but how different it becomes is, well, up to us.

Progressive Maryland is setting priorities for the Maryland Legislature’s session THIS Saturday

You're invited to our Annual Membership Assembly! for dues-paying members or members of our affiliated organizations.. Please join us (virtually of course!) this Saturday,January 9th, 2021 from 2-5pm so you can  learn about our top priorities for the upcoming session, get more involved in our organizing and participate in membership elections.. RSVP here to secure your spot. Not a member of PM yet? No worries! You can join by clicking here and then attend our membership event. 

We’re going to review the power we have built (including new elected officials) and the challenges ahead as we -- too slowly -- emerge from the pandemic emergency in Maryland.

We’ll look specifically at the Assembly session the following week on critical questions of flagging pandemic relief, and persisting issues of criminal and social justice, health care, climate justice and more -- and how we will vigorously and publicly poke the Delegates and Senators to do their job.

And we’ll elect new Progressive Maryland leadership to make 2021 another year of building power for working people and families.

Progressive Maryland is setting priorities for the Maryland Legislature’s session this January

You're invited to our Annual Membership Assembly! This is an important event for dues-paying members or members of our affiliated organizations.. Please join us (virtually of course!) on January 9th, 2021 from 2-5pm so you can  learn about our top priorities for the upcoming session, get more involved in our organizing and participate in membership elections.

More below, plus the latest on Covid defense, national Covid relief action and PM's landscape of activism in Maryland -- plus our recent blog posts.

Progressive Maryland is calling for Harford County Delegate Mary Ann Lisanti to resign or be expelled following both an allegation of racist speech and her tone deaf statements after the revelation of the original incident.

Lisanti has lost her ability to credibly represent the people of her district and make policy for all Marylanders. Anyone who disrespects African Americans -- as she clearly does -- has no business serving in the Maryland General Assembly.

Issues pending before the Maryland General Assembly have serious implications for people of color. Based on her comments, Lisanti shouldn’t vote on these measures.

School security and law enforcement officers should not arrest students for nonviolent behavioral issues in our schools. But they have the authority, and frequently abuse it.  Amity Pope, who urged the National Education Association convention to take action on this issue, says we should begin to remedy this locally as well.

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