May 2025

Many Hands Needed!  How and When Can You Help?



The League Book Sale will again be in Fort River Gym, despite the construction of the new elementary school. Construction will limit parking space, which will be challenging during the actual Sale Days, July 25-27 and August 2-3. Set-up begins for the organizers on July 1; collection will be from Saturday July 5 through Tuesday, July 15: seven days a week from 9:00 AM. to 2:00 PM. Evening sessions are from 6:30-8:30 PM on Tuesdays July 8 &15 and Thursdays July 10 & 17. The evening session chairs, like the daytime ones, appreciate the help of volunteer cullers and sorters.

Sign up for session chairs and cashiers has not yet been organized. The Book Sale Committee has its next meeting on Monday, May 12th; after that we will send out links to Doodle polls by a special email to all members and possibly the June e-bulletin. We hope many members will again be interested in serving as session chair for a session or two, or as a cashier. (Sessions for session chairs are morning 9:00-11:30 or afternoon 11:30-2:00) Please consider when you could fit one or two sessions into your July schedule.

Every summer we’ve been making more use of curators: the people who organize different subjects into subcategories. Generally, the better organized a subject is, the more we sell of it. This summer we plan to identify a head curator for the categories where there are large quantities of books. They will determine the organizing principles to be used by their assistant curators. We already have head curators for media, children’s books, mysteries, art and architecture, and history. Among the categories most requiring sub-categorization are literature, memoir, autobiography and biography, cookbooks; and religion and spirituality. Other categories would certainly also benefit. Would you be interested in curating a category of books, either as a head curator or an assistant? What would you prefer to work on? Let us know what your choice or choices might be.



The Book Sale, this important League event, is getting closer. Please think about what role(s) you might like to play in it. And remember too: for League members and non-members alike, this is an enjoyable social event. We meet old friends and make new ones while we work.

Susan Millinger

Chair, Book Sale 2025

Click here to contact Susan.

Know_Your_Rights "Red Cards"

In March, we distributed 1,500 of the wallet-sized "red cards", which summarize our basic rights. All people in the United States, regardless of immigration status, have certain rights and protections under the U.S. Constitution. Knowing and asserting your rights can make a huge difference in many situations, such as when ICE agents go to a home. The cards are available in many languages on the Immigrant Legal Resource Center website. Now, we have a second set available, in English, Spanish, Korean, and Creole. If you would like some to distribute, contact Milan Clark here.

Visit to Ruggles Center, Florence

Would you like to learn more about the utopian community and anti-slavery history of Florence? We plan to organize a LWVA visit to the David Ruggles Center in Florence next month. David Ruggles (1810-1849) was an active Black abolitionist. He established the country's first Black-owned bookstore in New York City, was a conductor on the Underground Railroad, and served as a mentor to both Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth. A walking tour of the area will also be available. If you are interested, please let us know. Email Milan Clark here or Martha Hanner here.

Judy Brooks Conversation: A Better Chance

On May 22nd, we will host a Judy Brooks Conversation with A Better Chance (ABC) in Amherst. ABC is a national residential high school program that prepares academically talented African American, Latino, Asian, and Indigenous American students from educationally underserved school districts for college and future leadership roles. Since the Amherst program began, over 120 scholars have graduated from ARHS. The event will be on Zoom; register here.

On April 17th, we heard an interesting description of Amherst's non-profit Mobile Market. The Mobile Market provides fresh, healthy, affordable produce for local families. About 80% of the produce is purchased from local farmers, generally the same day (really fresh!) The speakers stressed that the Mobile Market is a community event, open to all of us, regardless of income level. People bring their families, and then stay to talk, listen to music, and build a feeling of community. The market runs from June 11th until late October, at three locations on different days. Be sure to check it out! The recording of the event is available via the lwvamherst.org website.

Martha Hanner and Milan Clark Co-Chairs, RJC

On Sunday, April 13th, the League and Support Our Schools (SOS) Amherst held a Community Conversation on School Funding at Crocker Farm Elementary School. This event brought together approximately fifty community members to discuss the challenges with funding in the Amherst and Amherst-Pelham Regional Schools. Childcare and children's activities were provided so that parents of young children could attend. Participants heard a brief presentation on the current status of the schools' budgets as well as how school funding works, the challenges around insufficient state funding and the ways in which municipal funding flows to the schools. Participants then spent the bulk of the meeting in discussion groups, discussing obstacles to more adequately and equitably funding Amherst's schools as well as brainstorming potential solutions and paths forward. Many discussion groups focused on the challenges in understanding and participating in the budget process in Amherst as well as a need for more dialogue between the schools and the Town Council and Town Manager. Groups also identified the Charter Review Process as well as November elections as potential avenues for increasing participation of school funding advocates in Town government. The League of Women Voters' Civic Engagement Grant money was used to rent the space at Crocker Farm for both the Community Conversation and Childcare activities. 

SOS Amherst website: www.arpsparents.com

SOS Email address: sosamherst@gmail.com

Last month we mentioned that we are working on "opening up" college students as an advocacy group for single payer healthcare. We are moving forward on that and will have more to report next month.

We are excited that the Single Payer/Medicare for All national bill will be introduced Tuesday, April 29th. The 11:00 AM launch should be live-streamed on the YouTube channel of main sponsor Rep. Pramila Jayapal (WA), and then available here.

Given the continuing chaos in Congress, we are focusing most attention on state healthcare laws. Along with Mass-Care allies, Anna Carter and I attended Lobby Day in Boston on April 1st for the state-based single payer bill. It is first in the list, pictured below and linked here, of five Health Care bills supported (none opposed) by LWVMA. Four of the five are repeated from last session, but some may be moving toward passage. (For example, the "Momnibus" bill for improved maternal and child care passed last summer and moved off the list after a couple of sessions of work.)

It was a surprise to see that state-based vaccination information collection has been on our supported list for at least two sessions. Since it is even more crucial this year (with an anti-vax Secretary of Health and Human Services), it may have a better chance than before. We are also watching the Death with Dignity bill, in its second go-round, which has also had more movement this year than in prior years.

The one new bill introduced, S1526, banning for-profit acute care hospitals, was drafted in response to the Steward mass bankruptcies and hospital closures last year. The hospital assets (including the land) were hollowed out and "sold for parts" right out from under them by the for-profit, private equity Steward that bought them. The national LWV Health Care Reform network was following the development of that crisis before it happened. My testimony at Lobby Day in 2023 focused on Steward and predicted a bad ending. The Joint Committee on Health Care Financing listened politely, but did not heed my advice, and are now in reaction mode dealing with the fallout. My testimony—discussing why sometimes we would prefer not to be "right"—is available here: https://lwvhealthcarereform.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/MA-M4A_PrivateEquity_Testimony_BP-shorter.pdf

Please contact Barbara Pearson for more information.

Click here to email Barbara.

April Showers Bring People Power!

Big thank you to everyone who showed up April 5th (and more) to protest on what is happening in our country! We said Hands Off! And we said it loudly and in unison. LWVA took a busload of protestors to Boston, and other members went to protest sites in Amherst and around the state and the whole dang country! Some estimates are as high as 5 million+ people out on the streets! This is what democracy looks like!



In Boston, over 100,000 people heard inspiring speeches from Senator Ed Markey, Representative Ayanna Pressley, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, members from AFL-CIO, and more. There were so many protesters that I cannot say I actually saw or heard much, but we felt the power of the people! We felt the necessity to be there.

As we know, democracy is not a spectator sport. We need to be visibly out in the streets, in the halls of our governments—do not let our democracy go quietly into the night! We need more people to join us. It was a big event, and it must be the beginning. The LWV members understand the assignment—we’ve been doing this for over 100 years. So let’s ramp up our efforts together to get everyone involved while there is still time. There are protests every weekend, so get involved! Our country needs you.

Some shots from the April 5th Boston protest: Fearsome but joyful activist and LWVA member Barbara Pearson on left; on the right, attempt to convey huge crowd walking towards the Common.

Elsa at the Boston Common April 5th protest

Elsa's getting out there, how about you!? April 18th at Hands Off Our Schools protest at the Kendrick Park traffic circle.

The LWV Book Group meets the second Wednesday of the month, unless otherwise indicated, at 2 PM at Applewood, 1 Spencer Drive, Amherst. The building is handicapped accessible. Everyone is welcome.

The schedule:

May 14: James, Perceval Elliott

June 11: Necessary Troubles, Dawn Gilpin Faust 

July 9: Personal Librarian Belle DaCosta Green, Victoria Murray

September 10: Hild, Nicola Griffith

October 8: Why Nothing Works - Who Killed Progress and How to Bring it Back, Marc Dunkelman

November 12: Stuck, How the Privileged and Propertied Broke the Engine of American Opportunity, Yoni Appelbaum

Please call ahead to verify the time and date. We may have to cancel for weather or emergency appointments. Email Phyllis Lehrer or call 253-5179.

STEERING COMMITTEE

Andrea Battle, At-Large

Dana Carnegie, Recorder

Milan Clark, At-Large

Rebecca Fricke, Spokesperson & E-Bulletin

Susan Lowery, Membership 

Caroline Murray, At Large

Jessica Ryan, Voter Engagement

David Shanabrook, Treasurer

Click here to contact the Steering Committee.

e-BULLETIN STAFF

The Editor of the LWVAmherst e-Bulletin, Rebecca Fricke can be contacted here. Link checker is Kay Fite and Proofreader is Rebecca Curzon.