Hello! I’d like to share several updates with the community.
1. Last week on May 15th, MCDHH hosted a Deaf HH Constituents’ Day at the State House. We had a booth along with other organizations/agencies. We also had LEAD-K advocates/volunteers meet with all 200 legislators and share about the bill. It was a success! We gained several more supporters from the State House within 24 hours! Thank you, advocates/volunteers!
2. As you may already know, we filed the bill last January to both Senate and House. The bills were referred to the Joint Committee on Education. (Joint Committee means selected Senators and selected representatives serve on a committee together) Now what? We are anticipating a public hearing date. Please consider writing a testimony or coming in to testify.
3. The House bill (H.3550) is full and complete, but due to a clerical error, the Senate version of the bill (S.305) is incomplete. The lead sponsor’s office will take this up with the Joint Committee on Education so that the Senate bill language is aligned with the House bill language.
4. The ASL version of the bill is still in the works. We want to make sure that everybody is able to access to the bill also in ASL. We thank you for your patience! In the meanwhile, please don’t hesitate to contact one of the LEAD-K Core Team members if you have any questions about the content of the bill.
5. If you haven’t gotten in touch with your legislators, please do consider getting in touch with them! If you’d like to schedule an appointment, we are more than happy to join your meeting. Contact us at leadkmassachusetts@gmail.com.
Thank you so much for your support. See you next time with more updates to share!