Tennessee members

I want to encourage all Tennessee members of the forum to contact Bill Haslam's campaign and urge him to include extension of foster care benefits to age 21 in his plans. All polls indicate that he is very likely to become the next governor of Tennessee - the poll I saw within the last few days had him in a virtual lock on being elected.

I don't want to wait until after inauguration in January to press the issue, as the bills for the next session of the General Assembly are planned early. If a bill is not filed during the time for filing bills which mentions the sections of the state laws which would be affected, then we'll have difficulty in gaining the opportunity to make a change in 2011 (The state's constitution requires that bills in the General Assembly cover only one topic, which has been interpreted to mean that the "caption" of the bill has to include the topic and/or the statutes to be affected. While this is often loosely enforced, it's a hurdle that we don't want to have to try to cross later).

You can go to Haslam's campaign site: www.billhaslam.com and go to "contact us" and send a message on this. I recommend mentioning that the funds for this can come largely from the federal government and that it's cheaper than jail for those that get in trouble because they had inadequate support outside the foster care system.

I recommend that only Tennessee members do this, as people outside Tennessee pressing for this might seem inappropriate at this time.