New York Library Association warns of budget cuts
Walk into a public library, and what do you see? People reading books, magazines, and newspapers. Children doing homework. Others using the internet. Some will make use of historical online databases. Our libraries make all sorts of media available to us, and preserve the local history of each community.
Now libraries are expected to play a key role in the 2020 census. There is a plan to conduct the census largely online, with libraries providing online access for many who would not otherwise have it. Many New Yorkers are concerned about undercounting.
But as the New York Library Association has recently pointed out, the proposed New York State budget for 2020 includes substantial cuts to library funding. And this on top of an existing backlog of funding needed for library upgrades, including internet.
The good news is that activism has helped to restore proposed cuts in previous years. We can help by contacting our representatives in Albany. See Speak Up for Library Aid for more information, and how to take action.
Support Media Action Center’s FCC action to label Info Wars as fiction
Sue Wilson, producer of the documentary Broadcast Blues, has launched a campaign to require radio stations airing Alex Jones’ Info Wars to label the show as fiction. ( More About Sue Wilson )
At her website, Media Action Center, there is a form-letter to the FCC that can be printed out and mailed to the FCC. Drawing from court documents, it reveals how Jones perpetrated the hoax that the Sandy Hook school shooting never happened, which brought harassment and death threats to the grieving families of slain children.
One item to be filled in on the form-letter is a radio station in your area that carries Info Wars. For Long Islanders, that station is WVNJ 1160 AM, broadcasting from New Jersey. The station also streams online, and features Info Wars Monday through Friday, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Please visit Media Action Center for more information.
