Bridgefest and Parade

In this Email

June 20 2023

• Party News

  • NEW: A Note from the Chair: Welcome New Faces!

  • NEW: HC Dems at Bridgefest

  • NEW: 2023 Adopt-a-Highway - Round 1

  • NEW: AG Nessel Has a Message for All LGBTQ+ Americans and Their Allies

  • NEW: More Good Things Happening in Lansing

  • NEW: Changes Are Coming to Our Newsletter - A Message from the Communications Chair

• Upcoming Events

  • Save the Date - Upcoming HCDP Events

  • NEW: Community Events

Party News

At events over the past couple of weeks, we got a lot of new sign-ups for the mailing list. If this is your first email from us, welcome to our group of Dems in the Copper Country! We try to keep these to one a week unless something urgent comes up, so we promise not to flood your inbox. These also aren't fundraising emails - we'll be talking about events and news that we hope will be of interest.

The Houghton County Dems have plenty of events coming up over the course of the summer: parades, the Houghton County Fair, and more. If you're interested in helping out the party, we'd love to see you there. Regular meetings are first Wednesdays of the month in the conference room of the Super 8 in Houghton, 7pm, and we also offer a Zoom option.

This week, we have our Highway Clean-Up on Wednesday afternoon - see the details on that below. It's not quite as ritzy as our Spring Fling, but we come out in good spirits, and it's a nice thing to do for the community. If you can spare the time, many hands make light work!

Your Houghton County Democrats were out at Bridgefest again this year. Volunteers marched in the Bridgefest Parade, waved to those watching, and handed out candy to the youngsters along the route.

We also staffed a booth at Bridgefest, where we engaged Fest goers in discussion, gave out information on the Party and our meeting schedule, encouraged people to become Party members, and collected email addresses and donations.

Thanks to everyone who volunteered!

There’s still time to volunteer to join us for Round 1 of clean up on our adopted section of M-26. Clean up commences tomorrow, Wednesday, June 21st at 5:30 PM.

Our stretch of highway runs from just past Goat Hill Rd (heading out of Ripley) on through Dollar Bay. Parking is available at the Adopt-A-Highway sign just past Goat Hill Rd. We provide gloves, safety vests and bags. After the pick up we typically meet at Quincy's for dinner and conversation.

Please join us so we can continue this very worthwhile community service. Hope to see you there!

Attorney General Dana Nessel celebrates that Michigan said yes to banning LGBTQ+ discrimination, and would like you all to know that you belong here. Click through below, you’ll enjoy the video!

More legislative progress was made again this past week, and the Governor sent an appeal for aid to President Biden:

• The package of bills implementing the constitutionally mandated voting rights approved last year as Proposition 2 have passed both the state House and Senate. The bill covering early voting passed in slightly different versions in each house and will need to go through reconciliation before it can proceed to the Governor’s desk for signature. The bills mostly passed on party lines, with Republicans complaining they go to far.

• This past Thursday Governor Whitmer signed the CROWN (Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair) Act, passed both houses of the legislature last week. The bill amends the state’s Elliot-Larsen Civil Rights Act to prohibit discrimination based on hair, particularly protective or textured hairstyles often worn by Black people.

• Two bills cleared the House this past week (HB 4616 & 4617) that will ban mental health professionals from conducting conversion therapy on children to try change their gender identity or sexual orientation. The bills passed the House along party lines as two similar bills are making their way through the Senate.

• A six bill package to guard against child sexual abuse, that was first introduced in the wake of the Larry Nassar scandal, has finally cleared both houses, five years after Nassar’s conviction. The bills now head to the Governor’s desk.

• On Friday Governor Whitmer sent a letter to President Biden requesting a Major Disaster Declaration for six UP counties, including Houghton County, to provide for federal assistance to communities for emergency response and long-term infrastructure recovery in the wake of flooding last month.

After much consideration, testing and working to get ready, we are about to change service providers for the weekly HCDP newsletter.

The Houghton County Dems have relied on a free MailChimp account to create and send newsletters for several years - you’ve seen the MailChimp logo at the very end of each of our emails. But a lot has changed in that time. Features once available to us on the free plan have moved to their paid plan. And Mailchimp as a service has always been geared to supporting ecommerce activity, so has perhaps not been the best fit for us.

Also in that time many competing ideas and services have arisen in the newsletter space, and companies such as Substack and Beehiiv have sprung up that offer greater design flexibility and ease of access for readers.

Starting with our newsletter two weeks from now we will be switching to Beehiiv as our newsletter service provider, and you’ll begin to receive your HCDP weekly email from [email protected]. If you want to ensure that you continue to recieve our emails, please add this new email address to your contact list. For more tips on how to prevent newsletters like ours from going to your spam folder, check out this helpful guide with hints for a number of email clients.

I am excited for the potential this change represents. Some of that potential is visible now - I’ve put all of this year’s newsletters into beehiiv. Now, besides in your inbox, you’ll have the ability to easily accesss all of those past newsletters, and all our newsletters going forward in one simple presentation. Check them out on our website at https://houghtoncountydems.org, or directly on the new home of our newsletter at https://hcdp.beehiiv.com.

Thank you for reading our newsletter, and thank you for all you do for Houghton County and the Houghton County Dems!

Upcoming Events

Here are dates to hold for upcoming HCDP activities:  

• June 21st: Adopt-a-Highway Clean Up Round 1

• July 4th: Independence Day Parades (Participation TBD, but likely Lake Linden & South Range)

• July 8th: Strawberry Festival Parade in Chassell

• August 19th: Pasty Fest Parade in Calumet

• August 24 thru 27th: Booth at Houghton County Fair

Tue 6/20

• The Laurium Village Council meets tonight at 6 PM in the Council Chambers of the Town Hall. More info can be found on the Village's website. Additional information, including a video link to the meeting can be found on the Village website.

• The Calumet Village Council meets tonight at 6:30 PM in the Village Council Chambers. More information on the Council, it's committees, and minutes of past meetings can be found on the Council's webpage.

• Today is American Eagle Day in Michigan, by proclamation of the Governor. The day is meant to raise awareness about the bald eagle and the need to preserve the bird’s natural habitat. The day is celebrated nationally by bird lovers including those in the Audubon Society.

• Today is also World Refugee Day, as recognized by the UNHCR - The UN Refugee Agency, and here in Michigan by proclamation of the Governor. According to the UNHCR the day is meant to “shines a light on the rights, needs and dreams of refugees, helping to mobilize political will and resources so refugees can not only survive but also thrive.”

Wed 6/21

• Hancock City Council meets at 6 PM in the Hancock City Hall Council Chambers.

• Wednesday is also the date of this year’s Summer Solstice, the moment the Sun is directly above the Tropic of Cancer in the Northern Hemisphere. Wednesday will be the longest day of the year - the day with the most hours of sunlight. The weather looks good, so enjoy the sunlight and don’t forget your sunscreen!