February 16, 2024
For the last several months, our team at the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle have been hard at work getting ready for this year’s legislative session in Olympia. We surveyed the community to gather your thoughts on what our priorities should be, worked collaboratively to set an advocacy agenda, and planned Jewish Community Lobby Day yesterday for our citizen advocates to make their voices heard.
I’m so pleased to share that all of the prep work paid off! We were thrilled by the turnout for the first in-person Lobby Day since 2020! We welcomed almost 80 participants and advocated with 48 legislators and staff from 17 Legislative Districts.
Plus, Lobby Day made the news! Our advocacy for a suite of bills to fight antisemitism and hate was covered by KING 5 in an extensive report after the Federation sent an alert to local media. Check out the KING 5 video here.
I’m feeling deeply inspired and heartened by our shared work and want to give you a recap of Lobby Day highlights. But before that, I need to extend my deepest gratitude to Temple Beth Hatfiloh in Olympia for hosting us, my colleagues, Perri Doll, Cassie Garvin, and Aliza Mossman, for their tireless work, Hannah Lidman, the Chair of our JCRC’s public advocacy committee for her leadership, and our incredible lobbyist, Nancy Sapiro, for her guidance and support.
It was a chilly day in Olympia after the previous night’s heavy snowfall, but that didn’t slow us down as dozens gathered at Temple Beth Hatfiloh in the morning to learn about our main issues and get inspired by legislative champions like Representative Tana Senn and Senator John Braun.
That’s when the hard work really began – breaking into groups by legislative district to plan for meetings, assign roles, and practice our talking points. We then marched and bussed up to the Capitol to meet with our state representatives and senators.
In between meetings, participants passed out cookies at the sundial sharing five things you should know about your Jewish community. We were fortunate that many legislators, staff, and other advocates stopped to learn more about who the Jewish community is, what’s impacting us today, and what matters to us!
Inside the Capitol, citizen advocates like you engaged our lawmakers in powerful conversations about our community’s priorities: supporting Holocaust and genocide education, fighting antisemitism and hate crimes, enhancing safety and security grants for Jewish communal institutions, funding to preserve our state’s Jewish history, support for family’s in need, and other critical issues.
Thank you to everyone who joined us for Jewish Community Lobby Day and to everyone who magnified our impact by taking action yesterday!
We’d also like to thank the many donors who make exceptional programs like Lobby Day possible. Please consider making a gift to the Federation today to support this and other programs.
By making our voice heard, we made a difference!
Max Patashnik
Director of JCRC and Government Affairs
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