RECAP of May 24th successful lobby day

News from Maureen Mulligan,
PASEIA Government Relations and Lobbyist

May 25, 2011

Thanks to everyone who attended yesterday’s press conference and lobby day. We managed to cover all 253 House and Senate Members. (give or take one or two) From PASEIA’s point of view, it was an enormously successful event due to the efforts of the 92 solar business, 15 or more Harrisburg Area Community College students lead by Mike Barnes (I NEED SOLAR company), and the 3 or 4 dedicated individuals and businesses with solar systems that traveled to Harrisburg. Dozens of you spent the entire day to cover the 7 legislative visits we had scheduled later in the afternoon after a full morning visiting offices. Our regional team leaders from across the state were able to guide people both in attending our scheduled legislative meetings and our “ad hoc” regional office visits.

Brian Communications, the public relations firm PASEIA hired to reach out to the press is currently compiling all the coverage from the event. There were stories in the state’s two largest newspapers: the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Pittsburgh Post Gazette. We have been contacted by national on line, local print media and a few radio stations. In fact, I’m doing a radio show at 10:30PM this Friday night. Brian Tierney, CEO of Brian Communications and his associates are beginning work on reaching out to newspaper editorial boards around the state. Contact your local newspapers, forward them the press release, and write your own letter to the editor.

The effort is beginning to pay off. We’ve added an impressive 8 more co-sponsors to our list. Representative Ross expects to send the final list to be printed at the end of this week. That gives us Thursday to get your House member to sign onto House Bill #1580. The Representatives who were added today include: Kotik, Frankel, Saylor, Mundy. Day, Harris, Boyle, and Hennessey. I would describe these additions as fairly evenly divided across the state. Call tomorrow to follow up on whether they will co-sponsor or not. The feedback I got at the end of the day indicated there are a few others who said they would but are not listed. PASEIA Co-Sponser List

Saving Solar in Pennsylvania Campaign

More to come….

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