August 1, 2014

Dear friends,

Yesterday was a special day for all of us who have supported the High-Rise Safety Initiative in any way. After three months of pounding the NYC pavement, we finished our petition drive.

We started petitioning on May 1st after three months of working to build support and collect donations. Thanks to the generosity and faith of so many supporters, we were able to raise enough in those early months to get the petition drive started on time. Still needing more funds to make it to our eventual goal of 100,000 signatures, your generosity continued to pave the way until this past week when we reached our final fundraising goal and then finished the job we set out to do.

All told, we gathered over 100,000 signatures from NYC voters between May 1st and July 31st, 67,000 of which were submitted on July 3rd, and 33,000 of which will be submitted on September 4th. We could not have accomplished this feat without you and your incredible commitment to this vital cause. For that, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

Now the voters have spoken and it is incumbent upon the City of New York to honor their request for a measure to be placed on the ballot requiring the City to investigate the collapse of WTC 7 and any future high-rise collapses. We will learn next week whether the City will try to stand in the way of the voters. If it does, we are prepared to do battle in court, and we are confident of defeating what would be a baseless challenge to the petition.

In the meantime, let us celebrate and feel grateful for what we have accomplished. Thank you.

Yours truly,

Ted Walter

NYC CAN | tedwalter@nyccan.org | NYC Coalition for Accountability Now | 1 Penn Plaza Suite 6293 | New York, NY 10119