On Feb 7, 2019 Florida GOP Matt Gaetz was part of a House Judiciary Committee hearing on gun violence, but after he was called out for making things up by a fellow Congressman, Gaetz decided to take out his fury on the group of Parkland survivors who were in attendance at the hearing. Gaetz made a fool of himself multiple times during this hearing, and he helped to expose the ignorance of the GOP with his outbursts.
Florida House District 62 Representative SUSAN VALDES (DINO) joined the Republicans in the legislature voted YES on HB 1159 which takes all local control away from the citizens of Tampa who want to preserve our beautiful tree canopy.
Voted to pass a sweeping budget measure—one criticized as both "despicable" and "horrific" for providing massive giveaways to corporations and the super-rich while eviscerating funding for social programs, healthcare, education, and affordable housing. HERE
Less than a year in on the Castor regime and not surprisingly, City Council is discussing adding unmanned drones, as they did on the November 7th agenda item. Thank to Nina of the Democratic Progressive Caucus for bringing this to light. I regret I did not see the notice before November 7. But there's still time. DRONES WILL ONLY ADD TO OVERPOLICING, SURVELLIANCE AND MARGINALIZATION OF BLACK, BROWN AND/OR POOR CITY COMMUNITIES.
CITY COUNCIL AND THE TAMPA POLICE DEPARTMENT WORK FOR US! On March 2018, the Policing Project released a survey. The community of all racial demographics, but especially the black community, emphasized a need for community policing, implicit bias training, cultural competency training and better use-of-force policies. Chief Dugan is WELL aware of this survey's results. (Survey: Bit.ly/tpapp0318 )
WE NEED ALL CITY OF TAMPA RESIDENTS TO WRITE TO CITY COUNCIL, THE MAYOR AND POLICE CHIEF AND TELL THEM TO GET IT TOGETHER.