The first week in March of 2022 saw over 1200 GCA members from around the country participating in the Garden Club of America\u2019s National Affairs and Legislation Conference (NAL), held entirely on Zoom.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>We emerge from the conference with a list of key legislative priorities that offer\u00a0real, practical solutions, that if implemented and supported now will dramatically advance our collective efforts in addressing Climate Change.\u00a0\u00a0<\/u>\u00a0It is important to note that the GCA selects these specific priorities because they are pragmatic and\u00a0stand a reasonably good chance of bipartisan passage.<\/u><\/div>\n

<\/div>\n

Conservation Chair, Sam Muldoon and Assistant Chair,\u00a0Larey\u00a0Anne\u00a0Swanson,\u00a0were hoping to be on Capital Hill to meet with our state representatives to lobby on behalf of LMGC\/GCA\u2019s initiatives, however, they pivoted to pursue their work virtually!\u00a0Along with their St. Paul Garden Club counterparts, they\u2019ve met with Congresswoman Betty McCollum, Senator Tina Smith’s staff, and Senator Amy Klobuchar’s staff and report that all of our representatives have been strongly supportive of the GCA’s six conservation priorities. In some cases, the teams were able to bring\u00a0attention to elements of specific bills that aligned with our representative\u2019s\u00a0legislative priorities, which they greatly appreciated. Meetings with Dean Phillips and Tom Emmer are currently in the works!<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

These proposed bills support GCA’s initiatives which are identified, researched and explained in the GCA\u00a0Position Papers<\/a>.\u00a0You can review the NAL event and related information on the\u00a0 GCA webpage<\/a>. In addition to our delegates, LMGC had approximately 20 additional members join in – one of the advantages of a virtual platform – it can be far reaching! Here are a few areas where you can get motivated and involved.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Scenic America – log on\u00a0here<\/a> and sign the \u2018act now\u2019 email. This will help move forward the \u2018undergrounding\u2019 of power lines. Yes, that means burying power lines so we don\u2019t have to see them, or trees cut in disfiguring ways or worry about weather events causing downed power lines. A win, win, win situation! (PHOTO)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\n
- (RAWA) Recovering American Wildlife Act – this\u00a0video<\/a> will motivate you to sign the associated support letter.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
  \n
  \n
  \n
  The\u00a0 Break Free From Plastic Pollution Act<\/a>\u00a0discussed by\u00a0<\/span>Senator Jeff Merkley talked about. See why\u00a0Diana Cohen founded\u00a0 The Plastic Pollution Coalition<\/a>\u00a0– this\u00a0 5 minute ted talk<\/a>\u00a0will inspire you. See a\u00a0 webinar<\/a>\u00a0and petitions that you can support and sign\u00a0 here.<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
  \n
  \n
  \n
  Center for Plant Conservation<\/a> shares why seed collection is so important
  \n<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
  \n
  \n
  \n
  Representative Mike Simpson talks about the\u00a0 importance<\/a>\u00a0of dam removal. See this documentary\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0 DamNation<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0produced by Patagonia, Inc.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
  \n
  $\"\"$ <\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
  \n
  And finally, something simple and enjoyable suggested by Senator Mike Braun – “Plant a tree. It\u2019s the simplest way of capturing carbon\u201d.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
  The first week in March of 2022 saw over 1200 GCA members from around the country participating in the Garden Club of America\u2019s National Affairs and Legislation Conference (NAL), held entirely on Zoom.\u00a0\u00a0We emerge from the conference with a list of key legislative priorities that offer\u00a0real, practical solutions, that if implemented and supported now will dramatically […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16288,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[152],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16286","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-horticulture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16286","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16286"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16286\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16289,"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16286\/revisions\/16289"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakeminnetonkagardenclub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}