You are not alone, and you have the power to change the world.
Exercise your Power to Change The World!
I don't care if you are an environmentalist, history buff, transportation advocate, tax watch hound, corruption fighter, public safety zealot, child safety defender, education watchdog... red, blue, purple, green, white, black, yellow, liberal, conservative, young, old, rich, poor, male, female, or in between on any of that.
What matters is that you want and fight for a better world.
Even if you are just a simple concerned citizen who wants to change a few things....
Even if you are a social activist bent on building a better world.....
Even if you are highly educated and informed of a wide range of subjects.....
Even is you are just an average person who wants to learn what they can do to build a better world......
What matters here is your desire to make things better, and you have a better chance of doing that when you join forces with other people who want the same thing.
The focus is on local government.
When local issues arise, we learn about them together, and act upon them together.
If it is fighting a proposed extension of Craig Field to accommodate the expensive private jets of the rich, breaking the promise made to local residents to never seek to intrude upon their neighborhoods and homes, or fighting to save a historic landmark like Fire Station Five or the Annie Lytle school, or fighting to protect the St Johns River, or to stop the mayor from appointing another personal friend to a highly paid position they are not qualified for or giving money to one of his friends for "consulting" that violates the laws and standards he should be following, or forcing secret deals into the sunshine..... or even some small issue that would otherwise go unnoticed, if we all expand our concerns to include those issues, and write or email or call City Council or show up at meetings to voice our concern and speak up, we will have a better chance united, supporting each other, than the way things have been done up to now.
Let's face it. These political figures get big money from developers and corporations and bend to their will and walk all over the common people in the process. The media is owned by "the rich" and acts like a cheerleader mouthpiece for local government, so unless there is some real pressure to stop whatever they are doing wrong they will do whatever they want.
There are some good people in local government, but they are too few to stand up and make the changes we need.
4 out of 10 kids DO NOT graduate high school, and we wonder why there are so many murders and so much crime.
They mayor pays high salaries to his friends and to companies owned by his friends, and we wonder why many city services are limited or cut.
City Council gets so much money for their campaigns from business interests and land developers, and we wonder why they destroy historic buildings and build on every piece of land, never planning properly for the future, and then we wonder why the best city services are spent on rich neighborhoods, while drugs and prostitution and the homeless are so visible in so many places.
Do you really think they would let a homeless person with a "will work for food" sign stand at the entrance to a gated community?
Do you really think a whore could walk streets where homes are selling at $400,000?
If you are black and poor the mayor would love to take a picture with you and say how he cares for your kids, and would love to give your kids a book from his book club, but would he ever spend the night in your neighborhood or have dinner with you?
Instead of 1 hour of 3 minute comments by 20 people talking to city council about 5 different issues, picture instead 20 people at 3 minutes each talking about 5 different issues for five hours!
When one city council meeting ran late, and they had to continue the next day, because of unfair taxes they passed that they called "fees", despite the majority of people speaking out against it, city council was downtown until after 2 a.m.
They couldn't even finish their regular business and had to continue the next day.
Now picture them there like that every meeting.
The law states the have to listen to us, and we have the right to speak. They would get so sick of it that they would start doing the right thing. They would hear us, and see our power united and fear it as a force for change.
We need to have groups meet at the same place at the same time, and discuss our individual issues, then have a joint meeting where everyone gets briefed, then close by going back to individual meetings, then post plans of action on a website such as this so we are all on the same page about everything.
Let us investigate every campaign contribution, so we can see if they are voting or acting on a matter that concerns who gave them campaign money. Let us keep tabs on them, so we can watch for violation of laws and the Sunshine Law, then demand together to every agency possible anything illegal or questionable.
Let us file actions in Federal Court whenever they do something dirty or illegal, and get every scrap of paper and electronic mail we can to determine if they are above board or not. And when we find good people trying to do good things, let us support them.
When we get tired, someone can fill in, and when we don't know something, we can have others to ask advice from, and when we have a concern but never enough time to research, we can have people we trust to get the facts from and get a summary we can form an opinion from, and act upon.
You may call me at 781-9473, or email me at
NetJaxing@yahoo.com
and leave your contact information.
You'll get emailed updates and alerts to act, and can give your input to get your concerns shared with others.
If we spend one half hour a week just sending emails beyond what we do now, we could have a great effect on things.
They only walk on us because we let them.
Don't know about you, but I'm sick of it, and think we can do better....... united!