Assemblywoman Lieber presents Gulf Coast Relief Resolution to assembly Committee on Jobs, Economic Development and The Economy

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Monday, July 2, 2007 Cory Jasperson (916) 319-2022

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Assemblywoman Lieber presents Gulf Coast Relief Resolution to assembly Committee on Jobs, Economic Development and The Economy

On Tuesday, July 3, Speaker pro Tempore of the California Assembly Sally Lieber will present Assembly Joint Resolution 22 (AJR 22) in support of the Gulf Coast Civic Works Project, a national effort to develop federal legislation to create 100,000 WPA-like jobs to rebuild the region using Gulf Coast residents. Tomorrow’s hearing will be the first step in putting California on the record demanding renewed attention to the post-Katrina rebuilding of the Gulf Coast region.

“Too many families, the aged and the disabled, remain displaced with inadequate housing, shelter, health care, employment and education almost two years after Katrina devastated the region,” said Assemblywoman Lieber. “The post-Katrina recovery effort remains an abject lesson of the failure of local, state and federal government agencies to properly plan, coordinate and implement timely, compassionate emergency and reconstruction responses.”

AJR 22 calls upon each U.S. Senator and Representative from California and the President to support the passage of federal legislation based on the Gulf Coast Civic Works Project.
Amber McZeal, a Hurricane Katrina survivor living in the Bay Area, commented, “As of this moment not one unified, concrete plan has been presented to resolve the issue of the over 250,000 people still displaced from the Gulf Coast…the impact of the separation from our community has been devastating for all of us.”

The Gulf Coast Civic Works Project is similar to the WPA projects of the 1930s and early 1940s, which helped the United States recover from the Great Depression by employing more than 8 million Americans to build roads, parks and other public works. The Project was initiated by students and faculty at San José State University, and has been taken up on campuses throughout the country.
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