{"id":26945,"date":"2016-06-28T10:56:27","date_gmt":"2016-06-28T14:56:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/?p=26945"},"modified":"2016-06-28T10:56:27","modified_gmt":"2016-06-28T14:56:27","slug":"members-make-difference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/members-make-difference\/","title":{"rendered":"Members make all the difference!","gt_translate_keys":[{"key":"rendered","format":"text"}]},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Dear \u00a0Member:<br \/>\nRecently, Republican Congressman\u00a0Louie Gohmert of Texas \u2013 one of the most conservative members of the U.S. House of Representatives \u2013 cosponsored our two-person crew legislation, H.R. 1763, the Safe Freight Act. This show of support follows cosponsorship from Congressman Trent Franks of Arizona, a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus. Both are considered among the most conservative members of Congress.<br \/>\nWhy did Rep. Gohmert sign onto the bill?\u00a0The simple answer is that one of our members asked him to.\u00a0General Chairperson Steve Simpson\u2019s office is located near Rep. Gohmert\u2019s, and Steve decided to set up a meeting to engage the Congressman on our issues, including the need for two-person crews on all trains.\u00a0Steve didn\u2019t shy away because Rep. Gohmert is a conservative Republican; no, Steve\u2019s attitude was that \u201c<span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">this is my Congressman<\/span>, and I will request a meeting.\u201d They talked for more than an hour and Steve convinced this very conservative Republican that the only safe way to operate a train is with a crew of at least two people.<br \/>\nArizona State Legislative Director Scott Jones lives in Congressman Franks\u2019 district and decided to set up a meeting with his Congressman. Scott brought along a retired engineer who attends the same church as Congressman Franks and whose children attend bible study taught by the Congressman. Hearing from a trusted friend proved extremely effective as Congressman Franks came out of the meeting understanding the importance of two-person crews and became a cosponsor of H.R. 1763.<br \/>\nLast year, one of our bus members, Socorro Cisneros-Hernandez, had an upcoming meeting with Republican Congressman Paul Cook of California and contacted our office looking for talking points on our legislative priorities.\u00a0Ms. Cisneros used the information we provided and had a very productive meeting with Congressman Cook, after which he agreed to cosponsor\u00a0the Safe Freight Act.<br \/>\nMost recently, Greg Hynes and I met with another conservative Republican, Ryan Zinke of Montana. After a robust discussion about the two-person crew legislation, Congressman Zinke agreed to sign on as a cosponsor.<br \/>\n<strong>The lesson from all of these cases is that every member of Congress, regardless of party or ideology, should be viewed as a potential cosponsor of H.R. 1763.<\/strong>\u00a0Our Washington team will continue to do our part, but when it comes to issues that some members of Congress may not be naturally inclined to support, <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">our members \u2013 their constituents \u2013 are the ones who can make the most effective case<\/span>.<br \/>\n<strong>To do your part, <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">work with your state legislative director to set up a meeting with your Representative<\/span>\u00a0to\u00a0ask that they cosponsor H.R. 1763.<\/strong>\u00a0We can provide you with handouts and other materials to help.\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/static.smart-union.org\/worksite\/PDFs\/SMART-TD_BLET_Joint_Comments.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Our recent comments on the FRA\u2019s crew size rule<\/a>\u00a0are\u00a0a good source of information on this issue. If you do not know who your state legislative director is, a list can be found <a href=\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/td\/state-legislative-directors\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">here<\/a>.<br \/>\nIf we are going to succeed in passing this bill, we need to be engaged at the local level.\u00a0Special thanks to <strong>Brothers Steve Simpson<\/strong>, <strong>Scott Jones<\/strong> and <strong>Sister Socorro Cisneros-Hernandez<\/strong> for stepping up to the plate and taking the initiative in getting these new cosponsors.<br \/>\nLastly, please visit the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.congressweb.com\/smart_transportation\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Legislative Action Center<\/a>\u00a0to contact your Representative\u00a0about the Safe Freight Act and ask your coworkers to do the same.<br \/>\nIn Solidarity,<br \/>\nJohn Risch<br \/>\nNational Legislative Director<br \/>\nSMART Transportation Division<\/p>\n","protected":false,"gt_translate_keys":[{"key":"rendered","format":"html"}]},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dear \u00a0Member: Recently, Republican Congressman\u00a0Louie Gohmert of Texas \u2013 one of the most conservative members of the U.S. House of Representatives \u2013 cosponsored our two-person crew legislation, H.R. 1763, the Safe Freight Act. This show of support follows cosponsorship from Congressman Trent Franks of Arizona, a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus. Both are [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false,"gt_translate_keys":[{"key":"rendered","format":"html"}]},"author":6,"featured_media":25994,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[44,12,17,18,25],"tags":[2731,752,3341],"member_types":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Members make all the difference! - SMART Union<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/members-make-difference\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Members make all the difference! - SMART Union\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Dear \u00a0Member: Recently, Republican Congressman\u00a0Louie Gohmert of Texas \u2013 one of the most conservative members of the U.S. House of Representatives \u2013 cosponsored our two-person crew legislation, H.R. 1763, the Safe Freight Act. This show of support follows cosponsorship from Congressman Trent Franks of Arizona, a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus. Both are [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/members-make-difference\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"SMART Union\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-06-28T14:56:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/John-Risch.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"614\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"amyr\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"amyr\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/members-make-difference\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/members-make-difference\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"amyr\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/#\/schema\/person\/32d7996d81f2ddbf2099238b9315f71d\"},\"headline\":\"Members make all the difference!\",\"datePublished\":\"2016-06-28T14:56:27+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2016-06-28T14:56:27+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/members-make-difference\/\"},\"wordCount\":570,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/members-make-difference\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/John-Risch.jpeg\",\"keywords\":[\"H.R. 1763\",\"John Risch\",\"The Safe Freight Act\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Amtrak\",\"Front Page\",\"TD Leadership Messages\",\"Transportation\",\"Washington\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/members-make-difference\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.smart-union.org\/members-make-difference\/\",\"name\":\"Members make all the difference! 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