We don't have fair competitive elections in Erie County, which results in incumbents winning 90% of the time. We need term limits to move elected officials along and create opportunities for new ideas and new leaders.

The Westwood Country Club/Amherst Central Park project will cost at least 30 million dollars.

The Boulevard Mall eminent domain project and clearing is projected to cost over 30 million dollars.

Moving forward with these projects will cost the residents of Amherst tens of millions of dollars, and will put them on the hook for the potential for tens of millions of dollars in additional costs. Historically, large projects of this nature can cost 20% to 400% more than projected, meaning the projected final costs of these projects could be upwards of 200 million dollars.

Section 1. Purpose
The purpose of this law is to enhance transparency, public understanding, and participation in the
town's annual budget process. This shall be achieved by:
1.) The creation and distribution of a Citizen's Budget Overview; and
2.) Providing opportunities for public involvement in the budget process.

WHAT THE FATAL REGULATIONS WOULD DO
The proposal would limit the Committee’s purview to a single grant program for county-level community-transportation providers, who are not required to so much as listen to us. We would be prohibited from discussing or giving advice about any other topic. Our By-laws allow us broad discretion to help our vulnerable rider-constituents, as they have since the committee was created 38 years ago. These would be eliminated, along with the ability to modify them.
The proposed changes would violate both our original 1983 mandate and the purpose of the 1979 Act establishing NJ Transit. It would also violate the law that requires administrative regulations to support existing statutes.
Worse yet, the rule would silence NJ Transit’s only public-transportation advocates for seniors and persons with disabilities. A majority of our members depend on the services of concern and our committee has several members with nationwide reputations in the field. We are not high-powered motorists who make decisions about how much mobility is allowed to others, who have fewer resources and options; the majority of us are subject to those decisions.

WE’RE FIGHTING BACK!
The NJ Transit Board of Directors was all set to approve this “poison pill” aimed at our Committee, but 7 of our members expressed our dismay at their meeting on December 14th, and we convinced them to postpone a decision until their next meeting on Wednesday evening, February 8 at 6 p.m. This extra time was intended to allow us to work out a solution with NJ Transit management, but it took almost a month for anybody at NJ Transit to discuss setting a date for such a meeting; we still have not been told who was responsible for the change or who has the authority to reverse it. Since we had that meeting on January 17th, there has been no communication from NJ Transit managers to us, despite an assurance that they would communicate.
We ask for your support in opposing 3 sentences in this rule-making proposal that limits our purview; we encourage you to make your voices heard. Make a statement about how SCDRTAC should survive without change.
Here are our main points:
• SCDRTAC has been advocating for seniors and people with disabilities since 1984 without restriction on its discussions.
• The laws creating both NJ Transit itself and SCDRTAC give the committee a broad purpose, including not merely a single grant program, but any and all items affecting our constituents’ mobility.
• SCDRTAC is an advisory committee only, so our discussions cannot harm NJ Transit or any entity.
• This attack on SCDRTAC harms New Jersey’s most vulnerable residents: senior citizens and persons with disabilities, the latter a protected class under theADA.

SCDRTAC was founded to help senior citizens and disabled residents get better mobility here in New Jersey. We want to keep doing that, but we need you to tell others that we need your help. Please show up or phone a statement into the Board meeting on February 8. Please help us save your mobility!
Photo: MTA NYC Transit/Marc A. Hermann

The Bennie Hargrove Gun Safety Act, named after the student killed on his Albuquerque school playground by a classmate with his father's unsecured weapon, updates the outdated New Mexico criminal code and gives District Attorneys the prosecutorial power to punish parents who do not secure their firearms away from children.

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As of 2020, 40 percent of New Mexico households had at least one firearm in the household, with 64 percent of those weapons kept loaded and 21 percent loaded and unlocked, according to the state Health and Human Services 2022 data book.

According to the Health and Human Services report, federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention statistics show New Mexico had a rate of gun deaths of 14.5 per 100,000 in 2009, about four points higher than the national average of 10.1 per 100,000. The rate rose steadily over the past decade, reaching 22.3 in 2019, while the national average stayed relatively flat and was at 11.9 for the same year.

Hargrove’s shooting was one of at least 42 acts of gun violence committed on school campuses during regular hours in 2021, according to a December report in the Washington Post, which said the number smashed the previous record of 30 acts in a year.

“An estimated 4.6 million children live in homes with at least one unlocked and loaded gun — and most children know where these guns are kept,” according to the Children’s Defense Fund, a national nonprofit child advocacy group.

About 75 percent of children ages 5 to 14 who live with gun-owning parents know where firearms are stored and more than 20 percent of them have handled a gun in the home without their parents’ knowledge, according to the group’s website.

Motion C1.4 Cr Zannino
“That the City of Swan request the Minister for Transport; Planning and Ports; the Honourable Rita Saffioti, to ensure that –
1. A Review of the 2018 MRA Amendment 1313/14 Decision regarding the Realignment of the National Rail Freight Route, as currently proposed, is undertaken as a matter of urgency to alleviate traffic problems evident in the Town of Midland.
2. The Review reconsider the impact on the overall Vehicular Traffic Flows now occurring in Midland and planned.
3. Due consideration is given to a potential realignment of the National Rail Freight Route to a position east of the Roe Hwy, and the housing development within the Shire of Mundaring, so that disruption to all areas south of the existing rail route are fully considered, including the new growth areas that have emerged south of the current rail route, and were not included/foreseen in the earlier inputs to the 2018 Amendment Decision.
4. Recognition is given to these requests by the City of Swan is part of the City’s desire to address the historically long-standing problems associated with Traffic Flows within the Midland Town and Guildford in serving the multiple interests of a successful Metropolitan Centre. ”

Currently, access to the ocean is only allowed below the high water mark for “fishing, fowling, and navigation.” Rep. Dylan Fernandes has filed a bill in the Massachusetts House of Representatives, H.908, to add the word “recreation” to that list. Many other states allow access all the way to the vegetation line!

We need to democratize access to the ocean. Passing this bill will help us increase access for all Massachusetts residents. No one should own the ocean.

During phase 1 & 2, access and egress will be routed via Friston only.

During phase 2, access and egress will be routed via Wannock only.

THE ROAD WILL HAVE TO BE CLOSED WHILST THE WORKS ARE BEING UNDERTAKEN.

East Sussex Highways appreciate that this will cause "some inconvenience" to residents but the current gas pipes are beyond their life expectancy and are being replaced with new pipes to ensure future gas services continue

The timing of these works is paramount as SGN wish to minimise any inconvenience caused to the local community.