CALENDAR
January 15, 2024, Martin Luther King Day Activity, Livingston Senior/Community Center 11 AM-1 PM
January 24, 2024, 2023, Meet the New Mayor, Al Anthony, 7:30 PM via Zoom
February 3, 2024, Campaign School at Yale Workshop, Livingston Library 11 AM-3 PM
February 28, 2024, Amy Babcock. Livingston Library Director, 7:30 PM
PRESIDENTS’ MESSAGE
Happy New Year! May we all have a healthy and peaceful new year. We have several exciting
programs planned and we hope you can participate in them.
On January 24th new Mayor of Livingston Al Anthony will speak about current issues in Livingston and his plans to address them. The meeting is virtual, on Zoom and the link to join is here:
Join Zoom Meeting
Mayor Anthony will answer questions from all attendees, so come with your concerns/questions about township matters.
Please note that the date of this meeting was changed from January 17th to January 24th because of another event in Livingston.
Our member Patricia Russo, Director of the Campaign School at Yale has once again offered to hold her workshop on running for office, campaign management and civic engagement. With our co-sponsor, the League of Women Voters of the Montclair area, we are holding the workshop at the Livingston Library from 11 AM to 3 PM. Lunch will be provided, and the fee will be $25 for attendees and $5 for students and low income individuals. This program was well received last year and we hope that you will spread the word and take advantage of it. For further information e-mail info@TCSYale.org or phone 203.734.7385 or email us at livingstonlwv@gmail.com.
Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service
We are participating in the Livingston Committee for Diversity and Inclusion annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service on January 15th from 11 AM- 1 PM. At the Livingston Senior/Community Center. In addition to registering voters and providing voter registration materials, we will work with students to write letters expressing their concerns about issues of their choosing to our Mayor. If you want to volunteer to help us with this activity, please contact us at livingstonlwv@gmail.com
Membership
We are thrilled to announce that we had a very successful membership drive this year and have 45 members. We welcome the following new members: Stacey Abenstein, Joan Balash, Michele Christian, Dana Dang, Sacha Forgoston, Hong Gao, Carol Golub, Fang Gong, Poorva Gopal, Parul Khemka, Harsh Raju, Ellen Lazer, Lisa Sands, Raya Sapherstein, Debra Shelkowitz, Jue (Joyce) Xiong and Hong Yuan.
Please remember to renew your membership if you have not already done so. You can fill out
membership forms and pay online this year. You will still be able to submit checks if you wish. Please contact us if you wish to pay by check or are unable to connect to our website: https://www.livingstonlwv.org/.
Rally for Social Justice
On December 7, 2023, members Judith Friedman, Amy Ipp and Robin Weiss represented our League as part of the League of Women Voters of New Jersey’s delegation to the Rally for Social Justice. LWVNJ was one of the co-sponsors of this event which took place in front of the State House in Trenton. Various social justice organizations across the state gave speeches in support of lame duck session legislation about their causes and attendees held up posters regarding these causes.
From LWVNJ
Yesterday, Governor Murphy signed the "New Voter Empowerment Act" into This Act, which goes into effect in 2026, permits 17-year-olds to vote in primary elections if they will be 18 by the next general election. First introduced in 2016, this legislation was vetoed by Governor Christie. It made some progress in 2018 and 2021, but ultimately failed to make it to Governor Murphy's desk. Governor Murphy and legislative sponsors Senator Zwicker, Senator Beach, Assemblyman Moen, and Assemblyman Verrelli, with the support of advocates including the League, continued to champion this legislation on behalf of young voters. Over almost 9 years, LWVNJ staff and volunteer lobbyists testified in multiple legislative committees and members called and emailed their legislators each time this legislation was scheduled for a vote. This victory demonstrates that the road to a more inclusive democracy might be long and difficult, but the League of Women Voters of New Jersey has the resilience, passion, expertise and staying power to accomplish its goals.
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