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As you know, Heal Pac cannot afford to do regular mass mailings to seek donations to keep it's work going. We only ask for donations in election years when we mail out the Election Year Report and Endorsements List. Consequently, we get very low on funds from time to time, and that is where we are now. Because I have written so many donation checks over the last several months to state legislators who support our pro-animal protection legislative agenda, we are down to around $500; a dangerously low amount if we wish to keep working.

We are now awaiting the introduction of the bill to have a state income tax check- off to fund S/N and better enforcement of anticruelty laws. This will be a tough bill to pass in an extremely conservative state legislature (even though I have secured very powerful sponsors for this MHS bill). We need to do all we can to keep supporting the re-election and election of compassionate people to serve in Lansing----or else things will get even harder than they already are there.

Since we rarely pester people for donations, I hope you can take a moment and mail a donation of any amount you can afford to Heal Pac, P.O. Box 14291, Lansing, MI 48901 at your earliest convenience. We cannot afford to do a mailing so I am using email to appeal to a select group of supporters, including you. If you know of others who might help, please ask them.

Please know how much I continue to appreciate all the support I have gotten from you and others in the past. We are so blessed to have a state where a humane society (MHS) pays to have a full- time lobbyist fighting for animals, passing pro-animal laws, fighting anti-animal bills, operating a statewide Legislative Action Alert Network, and even having a Pac for animals! This is RARE; hardly any states have all of this. Plus, we have to struggle for monetary help---even as the HSUS (the most financially endowed group in the US) has staff who have established two different national level Pacs which (contrary to my personal request) have chosen to fundraise in MI when they have all the other states without their own Pacs to fundraise in. Don't get me wrong, I totally support these national efforts (they are long overdue and are being organized by people whose work I respect). It's just too bad that this respect isn't a two-way street. Why national groups can't respect and not do monetary harm to the mere handful of Pacs that exist in a few states in the US is utterly beyond my comprehension. I do urge you to not send money to out-of-state Pacs when we have our own viable, successful one here, which could have even more influence if we had more funds. And yes, I do agree that national Pacs deserve support to help them with passage of bills in the U.S.

Congress, but only if and when I see them getting more results than they are now. (We need the national groups to focus on getting a bill passed to ban Class B Research Animal Dealers/Pound Seizure. The USDA's budget has been slashed and this is THE opportune time for such a bill to be passed as inspection of the dealers takes more time. effort, money, and staff than the USDA can afford to expend; and they agree. As national groups, why they aren't doing this when it is such a politically opportune time? You should ask them.)