News

In This Issue:

• Webinar Tomorrow at 3:30pm EDT – Supporting the Partnership for Sustainable Communities: Tools for Advocacy
• Location and draft agenda for SGA Coalition Meeting – Please register by Friday 3/25!
• Please link to us and Share our *New* Coalition badge
• Welcoming new SGA staff: Abigail Gardner and Katy Hartnett
• American Public Health Association survey

Webinar Tomorrow @ 3:30pm EDT – Supporting the Partnership for Sustainable Communities: Tools for Advocacy

Smart Growth America (SGA) will continue its advocacy efforts in support of the Partnership for Sustainable Communities over the course of the next few weeks and we need your help as well. We hope you will join us, PolicyLink, Reconnecting America, and the National Housing Conference for a webinar on Tuesday, March 22 at 3:30PM EDT which will include:

• An update on the current state of the Partnership for Sustainable Communities in federal budget negotiations by Devon Barnhart, Transportation Policy Advisor for Senator Lautenberg
• A guide to local advocacy efforts you can take to support these grant programs, including:
  • How to schedule meetings in your District
  • How to call your Members of Congress
  • Email and Letter Templates

Click here to register. Please RSVP by 5:00 PM ET on March 21st.

Location and draft agenda for SGA Coalition Meeting – Please register by Friday 3/25!

We now have a location for the SGA Coalition Meeting – at one of our very own coalition member’s offices: the National Trust for Historic Preservation (1785 Massachusetts Ave NW, Washington, DC 20036). In addition, we have a close-to-final draft agenda.

If you haven’t yet, please do register ASAP so we can figure out our food and beverage needs. Even if you are local to DC, we do need to know if you are coming to the meeting and/or lobby day. You can find the very brief registration form online here. If you have questions, please contact Elisa Ortiz.

Please Link to us and share our *New* coalition badge!

SGA’s brand new website contains a list of all coalition member organizations with links to your websites. Now that we have a brand new website, look and logo, we’d love if you could update your website accordingly. We’ve created a ‘Proud Member of Smart Growth America’ logo that you can upload to your website and link to our homepage.  The logo comes in 3 sizes: 200, 300, and 500px. If you need additional assistance with the graphics, please contact Alex Goldschmidt. Also, if you’re not already a friend of Smart Growth America online, be sure to follow us on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook. We’ll follow you back!

Welcoming new SGA staff: Abigail Gardner and Katy Hartnett

Two new staff people recently joined the SGA team. We are happy to introduce Abigail Gardner, Press Secretary and Katy Hartnett, Director of Government Affairs and Outreach (as you may know, Devon Barnhart, who was the Director of Government Affairs and Outreach for the last few months, recently joined Senator Lautenberg’s staff on the Hill. We will miss her, but are excited to have Katy on board!).

Abigail Gardner is Smart Growth America’s Press Secretary. She comes to SGA with a significant background in government and political communications, most recently having served as the communications director for Congressman Dan Maffei in Washington, DC. Prior to that she worked in the press office of the Governor of New York and is a veteran of several statewide and federal political campaigns.

Katy Hartnett is Smart Growth America’s Director of Government Affairs and Outreach. She joins SGA after working on Capitol Hill for more than six years, most recently as the Legislative Director for Congressman Russ Carnahan. She also oversaw Congressman Carnahan’s work on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, where she promoted policies that would provide greater access to mass transit.

American Public Health Association survey

The American Public Health Association has launched a new project aimed at investigating and strengthening the links between the fields of public health and transportation, with special attention to equity issues. Please take their brief survey in which you’ll be asked to identify and briefly discuss the links between transportation and public health. They will use your responses to inform recommendations on ways the two fields can communicate and work together better. You may also share this survey broadly with your affiliates and colleagues across the US. Please complete the survey by Friday, 3/25 if interested.