Three Wins Today May 10 2025
I’m taking most of Saturdays off from now on, I’ll still have your three wins, for now, they’ll just be posted much earlier in the day.
Yesterday, New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed the budget into law. This budget includes universal school lunch, making New York the 9th state to do so. She talked about her support of this program during her State of the State earlier this year:
The research is clear: good food in the lunchroom creates good grades in the classroom. I'm proposing free school meals for every student in New York – giving kids the sustenance they need and putting more money back in parents' pockets.
Congrats NY!
The US Embassy attempted to force Stockholm, yes, that Stockholm to comply with their anti-DEI requirements. The Stockholm city council pretty much laughed in their face. Jan Valeskog, the vice mayor for city planning and sports said:
We absolutely do not intend to do that, it is the opposite of everything we stand for. They should withdraw these strange things…If the US terminates its relationship with the city planning office, the embassy will have difficulty obtaining a building permit if they want to rebuild, for example. That's their headache, not ours.
*chef’s kiss*
REI had an election for new board members, who were, by the way, uncontested. Pro-union people tried to get on the ballot but were blocked out, so the union fought a hard campaign to get this incredibly low-turnout election the attention it needed to reimagine the board. And it worked. The unions says at least 115k people voted and two current members of the board have been ousted and one CEO who was supposed to become a new member has been rejected.
Imagine if local groups around the country were fighting this hard for local elections…
The new CEO of REI, Mary Beth Laughton said about the election results:
[They’re a] clear sign to me that we have a big opportunity to actively seek out and listen to what our members and employees are telling us. Going forward, I’m committed to elevating more member and employee voices more regularly.
A progressive REI will be exceptionally powerful, if it can happen.
So those are today’s wins, hope you’re okay with them getting out early.
Our voices are our superpower, but only when we use them!
The REI election is a HUGE win! That's so awesome that they ousted some board members and rejected others. It's great to see a resurgence of union power. And absolutely, just imagine what we could do if people voted in local elections with this kind of passion. Thanks for the news!!
Taking Saturdays off is a great idea! 💜