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KY youth root out, end 15 year old discriminative LRC practice 'The Kentucky Student Environmental Coalition would like to thank Roy Collins of the Legislative Research Committee for his proactive leadership in helping the youth of Kentucky to root out and abolish this long-standing injustice that bars youth from engaging in our representative democracy and urge the LRC staff and administrators to re-examine their practices to ensure such discrimination is permanently expunged from our state. If any youth in Kentucky experience such discrimination, we urge them to record as much of the conversation as possible and contact KSEC immediately. Tyler Offerman Click on headline for complete article Commentary from KY Student Environmental Coalition KENTUCKY - On January 29th, several young, civically minded Kentuckians were denied the right to leave a message for their legislators by the Legislative Research Commission's Message Center. These youth were leading efforts in their communities to gather support for the Clean Energy Opportunities Act (HB 195) by mobilizing their peers to call their elected officials and ask support for the legislation, which would require utilities to invest more in renewable energies and energy efficiency and thus help create more green jobs in the Bluegrass in renewable energy and energy efficiency sectors. Students and non-student youth from the Kentucky Student Environmental Coalition (KSEC) organized the Call-in Day of Action. "We were expecting to make our voices heard in Frankfort around this important piece of legislation" said Tyler Offerman, a 25 year old from Lexington and the event coordinator, "what we didn't expect was for our voices to be silenced by those in Frankfort." As youth started to call-in from across the state, reports started to surface of callers being questioned for sounding too young-especially those with feminine voices and those in high school. Many were turned away when they told the phone operators they were under the age of 18. Eliza Devlin, a student at Atherton High School aged 17, says that when she called to urge her state representative to vote for the passing of House bill 195, she was told she was too young. "It is offending and belittling that because of my age, I can't voice my opinion." said Eliza, "After all, it seems to me that the people this bill will be affecting most will be the people my age because soon we will be adults and have to deal with environmental problems and climate change. I don't think it's right that my voice isn't allowed to be heard, because the amount of years is no measure to the knowledge and advocacy a person can bring to any cause." "They said I wasn't old enough and had to be 18 to actively show my support for the bill." said Daisy Borders, a student at DuPont Manual High School aged 17. Plenty of other youth received similar responses, being denied the ability to leave a comment for their representatives. Event organizers could not find any policies on any state agency websites stating such a policy existed and immediately called and demanded to speak with LRC administrators to find out why people were being turned away. Roy Collins, Assistant Director for Human Resources at the LRC, spoke with event organizers and clarified that there is no policy, local or state, that bars minors from engaging in the democratic process and corresponding with their representatives in Kentucky. Mr. Collins went on to say that this practice "has been in place for 15 years or so and no one could claim ownership for it or trace it back to its origins" and that "there was no official policy...it has been a practice that I was not aware of until it was brought to our attention." Mr. Collins then reinforced that he spoke with all operators and supervisors at the LRC Message Center, telling all too immediately cease turning away youth from leaving messages and that "every citizen has a voice and anybody who wants to call in can leave a message to their legislator." The Kentucky Student Environmental Coalition would like to thank Roy Collins for his proactive leadership in helping the youth of Kentucky to root out and abolish this long-standing injustice that bars youth from engaging in our representative democracy and urge the LRC staff and administrators to re-examine their practices to ensure such discrimination is permanently expunged from our state. If any youth in Kentucky experience such discrimination, we urge them to record as much of the conversation as possible and contact KSEC immediately. Tyler Offerman This story was posted on 2014-01-31 06:14:05
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