Howdy Huntsvillians!
We wanted to let you know about two opportunities for local transit advocacy.
First, on Wednesday at noon Alabama Arise is hosting a listening session on Zoom focused on state transit. I’ll be there and I highly encourage all you transit fans to attend as well!
Another way to boost Huntsville transit (and Alabama transit) is to reach out to Rex Reynolds, our District 21 rep in the Alabama House. He sits on the Ways and Means General Fund Committee and thus has the power to actually get some money into the Alabama transit fund. It’s got a management structure specified in the bill that authorized it, but no money thus far.
His email address is reynoldsdist21@gmail.com and his phone number is 334.261.0571. I might say something along the lines of:
Dear Rep. Reynolds,
I’m a Huntsville voter and I want to see more Bus Rapid Transit in my city. I’d love to know what your office is doing to direct money into the Alabama transit fund. Thank you!
(Your name)
I found out about both through John Northrop, a transit advocate in Birmingham. He runs the Action Coalition for Transit (ACT) whose main goal is to actually get money into this fund. To get notified of ways to advocate for transit at the state and local level, sign up for ACT’s mailing list here.
I asked John how he got into transit advocacy, and he told me it all started with climate. That got him to start attending the transit citizens advisory board (TCAB), which is where he heard a woman talk about getting fired from her job because the bus was late twice in a row, then didn’t show up at all the third day. “Transit is much more than climate,” John told me.
And it’s so true.
Hope to see you on Zoom on Wednesday, and at City Hall on Thursday for our first Week of Action event!
Til then!
Cathy