New York A5494: Speaker Heastie: Let’s Move A5494 Forward

Bastard Nation is a proud member of the New York Adoptee Rights Coalition

Action Alert for the Week of May 27

Assembly Bill A5494 passed out of the Health Committee on April 30 and is waiting to be heard in the Assembly Codes Committee, chaired by Joseph Lentol. Currently, 15 of the 22 members in that committee are co-sponsors of A5494, including primary sponsor David I. Weprin.

This committee has always been the stopping point for genuine adoptee rights legislation, and it will take Assembly leadership to get the bill out of committee and to the Assembly floor for a vote. We need your help today to make that happen.

Contact Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie
Contact Speaker Heastie today to request his leadership in moving A5494 forward. His contact information is:

Phone: 518-455-3791
Fax: 518-455-4812
Email: speaker@nyassembly.gov

We suggest the following message, which you can modify to include your own personal circumstances. Our advice is always to be concise and respectful.

Dear Speaker Heastie:
I strongly support A5494, an adoptee rights bill that will finally restore equality to adult adoptees in New York. I ask you to bring this bill to the Codes Committee agenda as soon as possible. The bill has overwhelming bipartisan support in the Assembly and is awaiting a floor vote in the Senate where it is expected to pass. This bill is a direct result of the Governor’s veto of regressive legislation in December of 2017 and his subsequent mandated work group.

This is a very important issue to me and to hundreds of thousands of adoptees and New Yorkers. There are already over 90 co-sponsors to this bill and it has wide bipartisan support. Please let me know your position on this issue.

Let us know if you hear anything in response. Thanks once again for helping us get it right and to make it equal.