Hi ,
On our last National Call for
Safe Technology Call and follow-up email we mentioned the Congressional House Energy and Commerce Committee advancement of seven INDUSTRY bills "to close the digital divide and Improve American leadership in wireless communications". https://energycommerce.house.gov/posts/e-and-c-advances-seven-bills-to-close-the-digital-divide-and-improve-american-leadership-in-wireless-communications
All but one of these bills passed 50-0 or 51-0 in committee.
We need to get on top of
this! This is an all hands on deck situation.
These bills would accelerate time for communities to respond to applications and create procedural hurdles that localities need to abide by, or the applications will deemed approved. They would also stop moratoriums on wireless, and take
away local protections.
We are assuming there will be companion Senate Bills in a similar committee as the House, however we have not dug into this yet.
Due to the urgency of
this situation, we think it would be a good idea to form a "subcommittee" who will focus on these efforts and calls to action for the rest of the group. If you are interested on being on this subcommittee (and/or heading it up), please respond back to this email.
In the meantime, we are asking everyone who receives this email - and especially those
who live in districts of members on either of these committees (see links below) - to send emails to committee members ASAP. They need to hear from as many people as possible.
Please organize and get people to call and email these committee members.
House committee members need to hear this was a big mistake and why.
Committee members in the House:
https://energycommerce.house.gov/representatives
Senate members need to hear that people are upset about these bills, why, and that they should not follow suit.
Here are the committee members in the Senate:
https://www.commerce.senate.gov/members
