Dear Neighbors,
Happy Easter weekend! Tomorrow is a somber day on Good Friday, but it reminds us of the miracle of Easter and Christ’s resurrection. I’m looking forward to heading to church on Sunday to celebrate the reason for this holiday. Happy Easter!
School Safety
Earlier today, Republicans in the House announced a series of bills we’ll push to pass this session related to school safety. Some of these bills include:
- School resource officers, student support personnel, and other school security programs funded through increased Safe Schools revenue, including a floor level of funding for small schools.
- School building security upgrades, and expanded use of Long-Term Facility Maintenance revenue for security projects, including emergency communications systems.
- School-linked mental health programming to ensure better outcomes for all kids.
- Physical security audit grants to provide state assistance to review facility security and crisis management policies.
- Suicide prevention training for teachers to help educators learn how to engage and assist students experiencing mental distress.
- School-based threat assessment teams established to assess, intervene, and report threats facing students, teachers, and staff.
As a former teacher, I want everyone in our schools to feel safe while they learn or teach. It’s so incredibly heartbreaking to see tragedies like those in Parkland, Florida, which is why we’re taking these active measures to increase the safety of our schools. By addressing areas like mental health, physical safety improvements to schools, and increasing school officers, we can create a safer environment for students, teachers, and staff.
Foster Care Bill Hearing
Tuesday, I presented my bill, HF3626, to the House Health and Human Services Reform Committee. The bipartisan legislation would create guidelines to help keep foster youth connected with their siblings. It does so by promoting close connections for foster siblings (when it is in the best interest of each sibling), including visits, phone calls, and taking part in important celebrations like birthdays.
This bill seeks to help those children who are among the most vulnerable in our society – our foster kids. We all know how important our siblings are to each of us, and foster kids are no different. Children in foster care already face difficulties that are tough to imagine, and I think this bill can help ease these hardships and promote healthy growth by assisting these kids in staying connected to their siblings as much as possible.
I was joined by two advocates who, while living in foster care, faced difficulties maintaining a connection to a sibling living in the care of different foster parents.
Sasha Martin (left) and Vivianna Castillo-Roybal (center) joined Rep. Bennett to testify in favor of the HF3626.
Sasha and Vivianna were so brave to come to St. Paul to tell their story and to advocate for this bill. Their testimony helped drive home how important this legislation is in helping our young people in foster care maintain the important family relationships with their siblings. With the help of their testimony, this bill passed the committee and is one step closer to becoming law.
Please Contact Me
As always, please feel free to reach out via phone or email if you ever need anything. I’m here to help and would love for you to contact me!
Enjoy your weekend and Happy Easter!
Peggy