Dear Members and Friends:

Thanks to all of you who attended the 2024 FL NOW Annual Conference. It was marvelous to connect with each of you. I know everyone saw high value in seeing and connecting with each other. The speakers were excellent and refreshing. They got high marks from everyone. In fact, the conference got high marks from those that turned in the conference feedback form at 4.4 out of 5. We got great constructive feedback to not have as many speakers to allow more time for discussion and questions. I also needed to run a tighter Sunday with one less speaker so as to end comfortably at 1p including the need to allow people to checkout. The panels and workshops were very well received. We have to keep working to get our A/V right since we do it on our own to save money (~$3,000). We had two glitches that were fixed. I left charged up for the ERA, Amendment 4, Medicaid Expansion Petitions, Get Out The Vote (GOTV), and more. I hope you did.

This election on November 5^th is so critical to our democracy and abortion rights in FL. Our top priority has to be GOTV to vote for Amendment 4 and a vote to save our democracy by choosing the candidate that is decent and committed to democracy and what the American people need. We may not be able to be partisan, but I think we can emphasize the drastic difference for democracy and support of our issues. The Biden/Harris platform supports our issues and has been endorsed by National NOW PAC. We need to work FL for Amendment 4, but in any extra time you have, please phone bank in one or more of the six swing or battleground states: Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan, Georgia, Nevada, Pennsylvania. Trump is ahead except in Wisconsin. I can send you the Atlantic’s one paragraph analysis of voter thinking. Just email me, dcdeland@att.net. FL will go Trump best as anyone can tell, so in addition to working Amendment 4, we should lend a hand in swing states.

All I have to say about the ERA is we never give up. Please sign up to follow the ERA Coalition at https://www.eracoalition.org/.

For poor women and children especially, we have to pas the Medicaid Expansion and Clean and Healthy Waters ballot initiatives. Please work with your chapter to get many, many petitions signed. Develop a passion for these initiatives similar to the passion we have for abortion rights. Remember affordable healthcare and clean water are human rights.

It is exciting that we won grants to support 14 Chapters to do 2000 GOTV Amendment 4 postcards in June and July with their local community. This action will have a strong impact. Too bad we can’t do 20,000 per chapter, since the lists we have by county are gold. Floridians Protecting Freedom (FPF) may have a postcard campaign we can support also. More to follow.

Please bring a friend or neighbor to a Chapter meeting and engage them in Chapter actions whether the postcarding, tabling, event canvassing, phone banking. We now have free access to phone banking app and the democrat’s database of voters to contact/canvass. The app is called NGP VAN. Now, we can do our own phone banking with Virtual Phone Bank and NGP VAN. Use of the Virtual Phone Bank and NGP VAN are free to the Chapter. I have asked the Chapter Presidents to let me know if they are interested. What would help is if a Chapter member stepped up to be the project support person. Please let your Chapter President know if you would be willing to take point on it. The tools should let us do phone banking in person or via zoom. We are members of State Voices FL a coalition of over 126 non-profits that focus on voting, ballot initiatives, legislation, and more. They offer a lot of tools to us free. More to follow.

One other thing. Many of us have been in leadership positions for years. We need new people to step up to lead our Chapters and FL NOW. Please think about stepping up to be President of your Chapter for example. I find it fun although it is work. I really enjoy the women in my Chapter. We also need a slate of FL NOW officers for the election at the 2025 FL NOW Conference. Please start thinking about it. The current board is currently termed out or will not run with the only exception being Communications Director and Legislative Director. So, for the 2025 Conference, we’ll need a President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer, Membership Director, maybe a Legislative Director and/or Comms Director. Remember the current Board came in altogether, so needing a whole Board is normal.

Looking forward to FL NOW Chapters getting out 28,000 postcards for Amendment 4 GOTV. I want to thank each Chapter for taking this on. We are just waiting for the money to get the ball rolling. For the immediate support from State Voices FL on phone banking just waiting to hear back from Chapter Presidents. Only recently asked them to consider it.

Last weekend, I was asked to speak about the League and our work on the new Amendment 4 at the Florida State Conference of the National Organization for Women (NOW) in Orlando. They had many compelling women speakers and discussed topics often centered on women’s issues – the right to an abortion without government interference, and the ERA. Congratulations to NOW President, Debbie Deland, and her team, on an excellent and educational convention!

I listened with rapt ears to Zakiya Thomas, President and CEO of the ERA Coalition. She stated that the ERA’s passage would make a big difference. First, as a symbol of full gender-based equality, it would reside in our most foundational legal document, our U.S. Constitution. This would make provisions for gender equality more protected and less likely to be altered by fickle legislatures who can amend state and federal laws a lot more easily than amending the Constitution. In addition, the ERA would guarantee that women were treated fairly and equally with regard to all rights and laws, not just limited to equal pay and employment, now only protected by state and federal statutes. The arguments were so persuasive! We must push past the log jam, where we have enough votes but the nation’s archivist has refused to publish the Amendment which is preventing the ERA from becoming a part of the supreme law of the land.

Next, the convention focused on a woman’s right to an abortion, and Cheyenne Drews from Progress Florida discussed the strategy to persuade people to vote for this amendment. It will take all of our efforts to win and we all plan to make that happen. NOW is also obtaining the addresses of people who signed the petition to get the right to an abortion, but their petition did not count because they were not registered voters. NOW will be postcarding these “yes on 4” individuals and telling them they need to get registered to vote.

Then we heard about reaching out to the Hispanic community to energize them and negate the false narratives and mis and misinformation that often plague this community. We were introduced to Mi Vecino, and Devon Murphy-Anderson, the dynamic founder and executive director. They are all about the ground game, door-knocking, and phone calls. They plan to educate about voting and to inspire Hispanic women to support Amendment 4.

It was also exciting to see some League members that I recognized as there are a good number of League members who are also NOW members. After spending a day at the conference, it felt like I was at a family reunion, greeting old family members and meeting new ones. I was amazed to see the similarities and differences of these two Women’s organizations. Whereas NOW focuses first and last on matters of concern to women, the League’s focus encompasses issues relating to all citizens ranging from gun safety, health care, education, and voting.

It was powerful to spend the weekend with such strong and determined women. Like some of our older League members, many spoke of past times when they fought for the right to an abortion the first time, not knowing that it would not be their last battle for abortion. I was energized and I was gratified to see so many women committed to making a positive difference. Together, with our allies, like NOW, Progress Florida, and Mi Vecino, we will all succeed on Amendment 4 and other challenges as we work to empower voters and protect democracy.

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From Left to Right - Elizabeth Zembrowsky (Elevated Access), Cheyenne Drews (Progress Florida), Jackie Pace Swigler (The Jane Network),  Beth Carpenter (Florida Rising) and Devon Murphy-Anderson (Mi Vecino).

From Left to Right - Nancy Terreri (FL NOW ERA Chair), Zakiya Thomas (ERA Coalition/ERA Coalition Moving Forward), Anna Eskamani (FL Statehouse Representative), Lori Berman (FL Senator) , Toni Van Pelt (FL NOW Coordinator of "Sign4ERA).