Fighting For You: Weekly Recap of COVID-19 Efforts
I know these past few weeks have been stressful, and I want you to know how grateful I am to all of you doing your part to keep our community safe. I want to share with you what our team has been doing these past few weeks to help families, workers, and small businesses cope with the Covid19 pandemic.
As the scope and threat of the coronavirus threat accelerated last month, and health authorities began to urgently recommend social distancing measures, our office transitioned to remote work, to protect both staff and the community. Fortunately, we had equipment and policies in place to allow a smooth transition to telework, and are able to continue serving constituents via telephone, video and email. For the present, Congressional committee and caucus meetings are largely being conducted by telephone or video conference. Instead of having meetings at our district office and tours of businesses, schools, and institutions throughout the district, I now spend hours each day in virtual meetings with staff, constituents, and businesses, and have daily calls with state and local officials, emergency management and medical providers.
When travel restrictions started being imposed, we worked with the State Department to help constituents stranded on cruise ships and in Morocco and Central America get home. And as schools closed and stay at home orders went into effect, we helped essential businesses obtain waivers to continue serving the public.
Here is some of what we’ve been doing the last couple weeks:
Voted in support of the CARES Act, the third major coronavirus relief bill passed by Congress in March.
In response to this unprecedented health crisis, Congress quickly passed 2 bills in early March to provide additional funding for medical supplies and research, testing, small business relief, and sick leave. The Senate proposed a third bill with massive corporate relief, but the House insisted that it also include economic relief for families, small businesses and individuals impacted by economic fallout from the pandemic. On March 27, I voted in support of the CARES Act to provide critical resources to continue combatting COVID-19.
The CARES Act is not a perfect bill, but it will deliver desperately needed resources directly to constituents, establish oversight on big companies receiving taxpayer funded grants or loans, and help our health care workers get the protection they need on the front lines of this pandemic.
This bill also includes provisions from legislation I authored to provide vital labor protections for professionals who provide care to people with disabilities.
Read my full statement here: https://medium.com/@repmgs/statement-scanlon-votes-yes-on- cares-act-874b594787f7
Led a bicameral, bipartisan request to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to request approval to convert Glen Mills School into a Federal Emergency Station
COVID-19 will have a disproportionate impact on southeastern Pennsylvania, and we must do everything in our power to protect our medical facilities from the surge of patients that we are likely to see in the next few weeks.
I was proud to work with state and local officials to ensure that our region has the medical capacity needed to address the pandemic. I led a bipartisan, bicameral effort to get FEMA approval to use the Glen Mills School as a Federal Medical Station so that our region has the capacity to respond to the coronavirus pandemic.
Read more here: https://link.medium.com/JOjv5rCMm5
Joined effort to convert Pennsylvania distilleries into hand sanitizer production facilities
Three weeks ago I reached out to Pennsylvania distilleries to see if they were interested in helping to fill the need for hand sanitizer, one of the first products to be depleted in the coronavirus fight. I connected with Robert Cassell, the owner of a Philadelphia distillery who had started organizing the 130 craft distilleries in Pennsylvania to produce hand sanitizer, but was facing regulatory hurdles and needed startup capital to begin production. I was proud to work with Congressman Brendan Boyle, and State Senators Vincent Hughes and Tim Kearney, to cut red tape for the distillers who wanted to do their part to help stem the tide of this unprecedented public health crisis.
Read more here: https://scanlon.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=150
Hosted a Tele-Town Hall for the Kids
We did things a bit differently with our town hall this week — I wanted to hear from my youngest constituents! Elementary school children asked me everything from “why is there so much chewing gum in the street?” to “how do homeless people get counted in the Census?” They also also had a lot of questions about what Congress does and how Congress is working to protect them from the Coronavirus.
I’m proud to represent such engaged kids!
Check out the town hall here: https://twitter.com/repmgs/status/1245003244700602368?s=21
Called on the White House to ramp up production of PPE
This week, I called on the White House to launch a coordinated and comprehensive federal effort to address the critical medical supply chain issues limiting the supply of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) needed to battle the coronavirus pandemic.
In the past two weeks, my office has fielded hundreds of requests from hospitals, local agencies, and health care providers desperate for these critical medical supplies. Many medical workers do not have access to the N95 masks needed to prevent infection, and many that do are being told to reuse single-use masks, often for days at a time, storing them in a paper bag at their workstations between patients. In the absence of a coordinated federal effort to manufacture and distribute PPE, using all the tools available to the White House, including the Defense Production Act, health care providers in PA5, and across the country do not have the tools they need to fight the Covid19 pandemic.
Read more about it here: https://link.medium.com/AAR6gFHUs5
As always our office is here to help and answer any questions you might have. Give us a call at 610–626–2020 or visit us online at scanlon.house.gov to connect with a constituent service provider. Hearing your stories helps me advocate for federal legislation and resources, so please don’t hesitate to give us a call if you’re having trouble. We will get through this, together.
P.S. If you haven’t done so already, don’t forget to fill out your Census! It’s easy, safe and important! Visit 2020census.gov.
