Hey New Life Family!
I hope the message finds you doing well!
This week, I wanted to highlight a few opportunities you have to be a part of our church’s work to change our city and state systems. We have some fantastic opportunities to partner with other organizations to empower our communities in the realm of state and local policy.
Joint Housing Group
We are excited to announce that we are launching a monthly meeting where folks from our church and our sister churches in LA (West LA and Hope in East LA) can meet to talk about what is happening in our city around the issue of housing. We will have monthly meetings where we can grow in understanding of God’s vision for a just city, educate ourselves about housing policy in Los Angeles, and mobilize to take action in response.
We have spent the last two months reading the book The Affordable City by Shane Phillips together. If you are interested in learning more but don’t have a ton of time, here is a link to a cheat sheet on understanding the book and its contents!
If you are interested in joining, please sign up using the form below!
Talk to your State Elected Officials!
We have an excellent opportunity in a few weeks: Have a conversation about housing with our local elected representatives (or their staff)! I am working with some organizations to schedule these meetings, but we need people to turn out! Elected officials are keen to respond when there is a small, organized group of people in their district who care enough to take the time to meet with them.
We aim to schedule the meetings on May 4th and possibly May 5th, likely in the late morning. If you think you are likely to be available (or if you have a flexible schedule and can make yourself free), please take the time to be there! Most people are intimidated to talk to elected representatives, but remember: they are the ones who should be scared of you! We will have time to train and brief you beforehand, and then we will take some time to debrief afterward!
Join Street Vending Campaign
I have had several occasions to advise folks in our church and community who were in the food business through the years. In doing so, I quickly realized how crazy our city’s regulation of street vendors is, to the point where the vast majority of them cannot get legally permitted! I had a cool opportunity to do write about this in the LA Daily News back in February and give a longer explanation on my personal blog in March:
A coalition of groups here in LA has been tireless advocating for reform for almost half a decade. While necessary steps have been taken to make life easier for vendors, a critical piece is needed to get things to where they need to go: reforming the state retail food code. Thankfully, a state bill will have a chance to do that this summer, SB 972. If you are interested in advocating for this bill, I will encourage you to join the coalition below:
If you have any questions about these things, please let me know! I am always happy to talk more!