It’s time to turn our attention to what’s close to home! The HPISD Board of Trustees Election is coming up soon - May 1, to be exact - with Early Voting in the weeks before that. Texas Local elections are non-partisan - and for good reasons! The concern we share with all our neighbors for the success of HPISD, and the careful attention we need to give to these election, bring us together. In that spirit, in the first half of our meeting, we are pleased to welcome the two candidates running for HPISD School Board, Place 1 -- Kelli Macatee and Doug Woodward. Each candidate will have the opportunity to introduce themselves, discuss why they are running for school board, and share their priorities if elected. If you have any questions for the candidates, please submit them in advance to info@pcdwa.org.
The 411: March 5, 9:30 AM, via Zoom. Check your email for the link! Share the link with friends in the district - and send your questions, in advance, to info@pcdwa.org.
It’s time to re-up your VDR certification! Or, if you’re not a Voter Deputy Registrar, it’s time to become one! March to the Polls is running training sessions, via zoom, that will make you eligible in four counties. There’s more information on our calendar, and you can sign up at https://www.marchtothepolls.org/act/vdr/training
Many of our neighbors are still in need after last week’s storm. Thank you to one of our leaders for these great suggestions about how to help:
If you are in a position to give, there are many organizations working hard to help families recover, particularly those who were already on the edge, recover from the storm. Here are a few suggestions of organizations that could use help providing emergency response/aid:
Heart House (refugee services)
Literacy Achieves (immigrant/English language services also providing emergency assistance)
You can also help us fight disinformation about what happened here in Texas. This is not, as our Governor would have you believe, about wind turbines freezing or about the Green New Deal. This was about a failure to adequately prepare for winter weather. A failure to winterize power plants overall. And about a lack of regulation. Per the NYT, "[W]ind power was not chiefly to blame for the Texas blackouts. The main problem was frigid temperatures that stalled natural gas production, which is responsible for the majority of Texas’ power supply. Wind makes up just a fraction — 7 percent or so, by some estimates — of the state’s overall mix of power generation this time of year."
And finally, you can keep an eye on and help us invest in a new generation of Texas leadership. We have a gubernatorial election coming up in 2022, and Ted "Cancun" Cruz will be running for re-election in 2024. We need to invest now in the kind of ground game that Georgia developed if we want to see change. You can help by giving to grassroots and grasstops organizing efforts, like those led by the Lonestar Project, Faith in Texas, Texas Organizing Project, and March To the Polls.