Dear Docs,
Update PPGV. This is our update after school shootings at Parkland, Fl and now Santa Fe in Texas. As bad as it is the students have really reenergized all of us and are intent on making schools and the communities safer. Let us hope!
Stopped!? Over 30 Michigan bills in 2017 have not been enacted and that would have made us less safe. Our legislature has decided that the time is not right- thank God! Otherwise we would have allowed more guns in previously banned places like hospitals, schools and bars.
Push- A Good Public Health Bill. A so-called Extreme Risk Protection Order (HB 4706) is stuck in the Judiciary Committee. We need to advocate for it and find Republican legislators who will sign on. Dr. Sonya Lewis will send instructions to push for this bill.
Volunteering Anyone? We need a member who will help with our website conversion, our list conversion to include zip codes, – useful tech work. If you know of someone with good tech skills let us know, please. We are also looking for an assistant treasurer to work with our current treasurer and then assume that responsibility. Email your interest to jswalden@gmail.com.
Wear Orange Day is again celebrated on June 2. Moms Demand Action is organizing this. Sonya Lewis is speaking and PPGV members are invited to Liberty Park at 1-4. Wear orange and wear your white coats.
Earlier this month, Dr. Lewis was a co-presenter at the 2018 Annual American Psychiatric Association meetings in New York City, collaborating with psychiatrists Captain James West of Uniformed Services University, Dr. Janee Mestrovich of Uniformed Services University, Dr. Matthew Goldenberg of Yale University, to present an interactive workshop titled, “Patients and Personal Firearms: Approaches to the Physician-Patient Conversation to Reduce Risk”.
Dr. Lewis served as a panelist for a presentation titled, “Health Policy: Solutions for Reducing Gun Violence in the United States” organized by the Health Policy Student Association, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI.
PPGV collaborated with the Washtenaw Youth Initiative to support the “Student-Led Die-In” in Ann Arbor in response to the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting. Ann Arbor Mayor, Christopher Taylor and AAPS Superintendent, Dr. Jeanice Swift spoke at this event in addition to several passionate student speakers. The event was attended by the League of Women Voters who registered many students to vote.
PPGV lent financial support to the Neutral Zone to help fund a group of six high school students who traveled to Washington, D.C. to attend the March for our Lives.
National Die-In. June 12. Next for the student movement is an event in Washington, DC and everywhere else. Stay tuned.