Last week, I had the pleasure of attending and presenting at the VTA conference and Hill day in Washington, D.C. One might expect the event to be a solemn occasion marked by lots of business owners holding hands and crying on shoulders, the event was anything but that. There is a renewed vigor and fight in the business community and responses from consumers are helping.
In just a matter of three days, tens of thousands of people responded to our call for emails and phone calls to the President and members of Congress. Those messages were delivered while business owners took to Capitol Hill on Wednesday and are continuing to be delivered as more consumers get involved. While there is still a lot of uncertainty within the industry about how federal regulations will shake out, it is clear that we need more consumer voices.
Rather than focus on all of the bad news from the past week (there’s plenty of that in the links below), I want to take a moment to share some gratitude to all of our volunteers who are managing our state Facebook groups and helping to build our army of consumers. If you haven’t joined your state group yet, you can find a link to it in our “Get Involved” tab, under “Find My State Info,” here.
Vaping has always been a from-the-ground-up consumer movement. Although we are in the midst of some very dark times, pulling together and supporting one another is absolutely an unbreakable feature of the vaping community–even when things are rife with drama.
So, without further ado, a warm and sincere THANK YOU to all of the people working behind the scenes to build our community and make this a better place to vape.
Alabama: Shane Oakley, Michelle Hughes
Arkansas: Jacob Hubbard, Justin Yeates
California: Daniel Downes, Anthony Barajas-Carver
Colorado: Brie Starr,Ryan Breault
Connecticut: Christine Solazzo, Joseph Jay Cooper
Florida: Ricky Bright, Cindi Kinch, Nicholas Aaron Seabolt
Georgia: Amy Mohon, Tammy Michaud
Illinois: Mike Olson, Jennifer Buksar
Indiana: Jennifer Buksar, Heather R. Miller
Iowa: Missy Adams, Anthony Willwerth
Kansas: Ominette Celli
Kentucky: Ryan McDanel, Matt Stinger, Chad Johns, Amber Storer
Louisiana: Bella Yuce, Joseph Bullet Blanchard
Maryland: Amber Hetrisk Perdue
Massachusetts: Nick Green
Michigan: Jonathon Schnittker, Debbye Saladine Thompson, Jessica Roland
Missouri: Tyler Williamson, Marvin Cosper
Montana: Tim Mahoney, Tammie Auras
Nevada: Desiree Weiss
New York: Corey Olivieri, Duane Bazazian
North Carolina: Frank Randazzo, Allen Davis
North Dakota: Dan Tipton
Ohio: Lisa Combs Church, Amber Storer
Pennsylvania: Greg Henry, Becca Blair
South Carolina: Chrissie Eagle Littleton, Goldie Cooley, Bridget Leigh Williams
South Dakota: Lee Stricherz, Jeff Porter
Tennessee: Allen Davis, Mikael Billiter
Texas: Kenneth Greenwood, Angela Renee Garrity
Utah: Leann Rietbrock
Vermont: Joe Fiorini
Virginia: Yvonne Settembrino, Marcus Mikesell
Washington: Brett Colley
Wisconsin: Robb Ryan, Kristin Noll-Marsh
West Virginia: Bruce Gowans, Michael Hammond
Wyoming: Matt Jenkins
Stay safer,
Alex Clark, CEO
CASAA
This Week’s News:
Heads Up:
Tuesday, September 24 seems to be a popular day for pushing anti-vaping bills through various legislative bodies. This is not necessarily an exhaustive list, it’s just a collection of what we have right now. Be On the LookOut!
- TAKE ACTION – IL – Public Meeting on 09.23.19 (Monday) – Mental Health Committee to Discuss a Response to “The Vaping Crisis.”
- TAKE ACTION – NY – Albany County, PUBLIC HEARING on 09.24.19, 7:15 PM, on Local Law “E”, a flavor ban on vaping, but not combustible products.
- TAKE ACTION – NY – Hempstead Twp., PUBLIC HEARING on 09.24.19, 7:00 PM, on a Flavor Ban ordinance.
- TAKE ACTION – NJ – Vaping Task Force, PUBLIC MEETING on 09.24.19, 4:00 PM. The dress code is business casual and anyone who plans to speak should be rehearsed and plan for 2 – 3 minutes.
- TAKE ACTION – CA – Los Angeles County, Flavor Ban PUBLIC HEARING, 09.24.19, 9:30 AM
- TAKE ACTION – CA – Burbank, Flavor Ban PUBLIC HEARING, 09.24.19, 6:00 PM.
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- TAKE ACTION – NYC FLAVOR BAN IS HEADING BACK TO CITY COUNCIL! (Sept. 10)
- TAKE ACTION – US – VAPING PROHIBITION IS ON THE TABLE IN CONGRESS!
- CT – (Pending) – “State Leaders Call for Ban on Vaping, e-cigarette products.” (Sept. 13)
- CA – Emily Deruy (The Mercury News) – “San Jose councilwoman proposes ban on vaping products.” (Sept. 15)
- CA – (Heads Up) – “Governor Gavin Newsom Signs Executive Order to Confront Youth Vaping Epidemic.” (Sept. 16)
- MI – (Pending) – “LaFave: Unwise unilateral executive action must be stopped.” (Sept. 18)
- Related – “Michigan officially bans sale of flavored e-cigarettes.” (Sept. 18)
- OH – (Heads Up) – “Gov. Mike DeWine says he’s looking into a statewide ban on flavored e-cigarettes.” (Sept. 17)
- TX – San Antonio (Heads Up) – “EXCLUSIVE: S.A. Could Become First in Texas to Ban ‘Fruit Flavored’ Vaping.” (Sept. 19)
- Find your city council district and councilmember, here.
- SC – (Pending) – “SC Lawmakers consider ban on flavored e-cigarette, vaping products, raising minimum age.” (Sept. 17)
- MS – (Pending) – “AG Hood looks to ban vaping in Mississippi.” (Sept. 19)
Highlights: (Sept. 16) (Sept. 19) (Sept. 20)
- “The Help A Smoker In Recovery Project is looking for vaping products to give those entering treatment for addiction. …” (Sept. 9)
- Monique Calello (news leader) – “Vaping and lung illness: Scott Ballin says health officials send wrong message.” (Sept. 13)
- Editorial Board (The Philadelphia Inquirer) – “Regulating e-cigarettes requires a scalpel, not a hammer.” (Sept. 16)
- Tony Dukopil (CBS Morning News) [Must Watch] – “Public health expert on e-cigarette panic.” (Sept. 20)
- Related – Give Tony a follow on Twitter: @tonydokoupil
- Bill Johnson (FetchYourNews.com) – “[Dawsonville, GA] Commissioners hit pause button on vape ordinance.” (Sept. 20)
- Like getting this timely information? Help CASAA continue its mission by donating HERE.
- If you’re on Facebook, please be sure to join your CASAA state group to help prevent anti-harm reduction laws like these from spreading through your state! Click here to find your state group: CASAA State Facebook Group List
- Find your state information here: Find My State Info – CASAA
- And remember to officially join CASAA. Membership is FREE.
CASAA is made stronger with every voice we can count!