Legislative Visits

First photo: Senator Ranenhofer

Second photo:
Assemblyman Quinn



I’m taking a quick hiatus from my Australia chronicles to talk a little bit about some legislative visits I got to be a part of on Friday, January 29th.

I had spent the day before running around New York City with two friends. It was just one of those day trips, so after completely exhausting ourselves in Central Park, Times Square, and in all the Fifth Avenue shops where we can’t afford anything, we hopped back on the Megabus at 10 pm. After spending the night trying to sleep on our uncomfortable bus seats, we arrived back in Buffalo at 5:15.

Two hours later, on no additional sleep, I left the house to go on my first legislative visit of the day. I met up with Anthony Billoni and Hillary Clarke of the Erie County Tobacco Control Program at New York State Senator Ranzenhofer’s office. I first met Anthony Billoni and Hillary Clarke at the legislative breakfast I attended last March. They had asked me to accompany them on these visits to represent the interests of the Tobacco Control Program’s youth organization, Reality Check. (I’ve mentioned Reality Check a number of times on this blog.)

Once we met with Senator Ranzenhofer, we discussed all of the initiatives the Tobacco Control Program currently has in play, and asked him for his support. I spoke about my involvement with Reality Check and our current projects in progress, which include our Tobacco-Free Movies initiative (which would give all movies with smoking in them an instant “R” rating), our Selective Binding Agreement (which pushes magazine publishers to remove tobacco advertisements from magazines being shipped to libraries and schools), and our Point of Sale Campaigns (which encourages stores to either stop selling cigarettes, or at least remove their tobacco advertisements from display).

Our visit went very well, and we then made our way over to Assemblyman Quinn’s office. (And I quickly taught myself how to drive on the thruway…). We talked once again about all of the current programs in the works, many of which Assemblyman Quinn was quite familiar with. During the discussion, an interesting point got brought up about, of all things, “Avatar”. Don’t get me wrong, I love the film, but did anyone else find it odd that Sigourney Weaver’s character needed to smoke after every Avatar session? Wouldn’t a tree-hugging scientist hundreds of years in the future be a little concerned about her nasty cigarette butts?

Anyway, both visits went well, and I’m hoping to do a few more in the coming weeks.

The next blog should have us back in Australia. I’m pretty sure I have to explain the “coat of arms” lunch next!