1. Plan your babysitters now!!
2. Arrive as early as you can. The hearing can potentially start anywhere from 10-1:30.
3. Consider getting an app to help you find parking!!
4. Bring food and bottles for water. You cannot have food and open beverages in the hearing rooms, but you can bring food in to eat in the hallways. This will be a VERY long day, be prepared!! There is a cafeteria in the basement, but options are limited.
5. Phone charges and/or battery packs to make sure you have battery life for the duration.

1. Be upfront with your stance at the very start. For example, My name is Joe, I oppose this bill because I believe it is an infringement on my personal privacy. Then back up your stance.
2. Don’t waste testimony time on introducing yourself, addressing the committee or telling your back story. Get straight to your point. Leave time to respond to people that spoke before you that were inaccurate. Leave time to ask the bill sponsors for clarification. (If you have read the bill, you know that there is a lot that needs clarification.)
3. Ask questions! The bill is poorly written and confusing. Please feel free to ask the sponsors of the bill to clarify points for you.
4. Mention lack of stakeholder process every opportunity you have. “You would know that this won’t work with families/schools/doctors if you had done any stakeholder meetings at all.” “You might not know this because of the lack of stakeholder meetings.” (CHCA and NVIC, the two largest stakeholders were not consulted AT ALL.)
5. You can refer to choices in exemptions as “personal lifestyle choices”
6. Stick to talking about the bill, site specific lines that you have problems with and why.
7. Focus on data breaches, privacy issues.
8. DO NOT SAY “non-medical” exemptions. They are RELIGIOUS and PERSONAL BELIEF exemptions and should remain that way.
9. Please use the terms: shaming, bullying, targeting, discrimination, labeling and segregation in reference to separating those who cannot or choose not to participate in the vaccine program.
10. Talk about concerns with submitting personal identifying information (PII) along with highly confidential medical information to the department of public health.
11. If you want to compare the database to other registries, please compare to other infectious diseases. For example, compare keeping a database of those who exempt from one or more vaccines with a database of children with AIDS, hepatitis or an STD, not with those who have non-infectious diseases.
12. Discuss issues surrounding having a doctor validate a religious or personal belief exemption.
13. Quarantining healthy people is segregation.
14. Discuss loss of FERPA rights for opting out of even one vaccine.

Before Wednesday, call your legislators, committee members and the Governor’s office to let them know how you feel about this bill!!!

See our homepage for contact information: https://cohealthchoice.org/

See you on Wednesday!