Friends, Members, and Michiganders 

We are at a critical moment when it comes to protecting our Great Lakes, beautiful dunes, rivers, waterways, and the health of Michigan communities. While we face many challenges at the federal level and in the Michigan Legislature, we have made significant progress in electing environmental champions, notably Gretchen Whitmer as governor. 

Last year’s Lame Duck session saw a barrage of dangerous and misguided legislation enacted into law. There is much work to be done to make up for lost ground and protect our air, land and water. 

Oil continues to flow under the Straits of Mackinac through the 66-year-old Line 5 Pipeline, threatening a catastrophic oil spill, and contributing daily to climate change. Harmful Algal blooms worsen each year in size and impact to our Great Lakes. Lead and toxic PFAS chemicals threaten the drinking water of communities across our state. 

Amidst these challenges, we also have a governor who has taken significant action during her short time in office. She restructured and revamped the Department of Environmental Quality to refocus its mission on protecting the health of communities and our Great Lakes. She has committed to tackling climate change, creating an office of Energy and Climate. She has fought hard for funding for drinking water protections in the state budget and has appointed environmental champions to key state posts. And beyond her work in Michigan, she is leading a coalition of Great Lakes governors to set an agenda for candidates in 2020 to protect our Great Lakes, home to 90% of the nation’s fresh water. 

With these unique opportunities and challenges, we are proud to launch our modernized legislative scorecard that includes very important upgrades from scorecards in years past to help you stay up to date on how your lawmaker votes – in near real time. 

Our new scorecard is a powerful tool that allows members of the public to track lawmakers’ votes on critical environmental issues quickly after they happen. We live in a digital age, and our new scorecard is designed to integrate seamlessly with online platforms and social media, like Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. 

It is our goal to make tracking your lawmaker and knowing the ins and outs of specific policies as easy and accessible as possible. That’s because it is on us – voters and constituents – to hold them accountable and make our air, land, Great Lakes and health top priorities. 

We could not do this without your support and action. We have tremendous opportunity to make progress on tackling climate change and ensuring all Michigan communities have safe water to drink and natural resources that their children and grandchildren can enjoy. I am truly excited to share this new tool with you and hope it serves as a resource for all our members. 

Sincerely, 

Lisa Wozniak