Something to celebrate this July 4th: 67,000 signatures submitted!
NYC CAN

HighRiseSafetyNYC.org July 3, 2014

WE DID IT!

67,192 signatures submitted to the City of New York

Representatives of the High-Rise Safety Initiative stand in front of the City Clerk's office on July 3, 2014 before submitting 67,192 signatures. Left to right: Ted Walter, NYC CAN Executive Director; Valerie Lucznikowska, Aunt of Adam Arias; Bob McIlvaine, Father of Bobby McIlvaine.

67,192 Signatures Submitted

We are proud to announce that earlier today we submitted over 67,000 signatures to the City of New York - 37,000 more than the requisite number for a charter amendment to be submitted to the voters at this November's election. If passed by voters on November 4th, it would require the City's Department of Buildings to investigate the collapse of WTC 7 and any future high-rise collapses. We would like to extend our deepest gratitude to everyone who contributed blood, sweat, tears and hard-earned dollars toward this remarkable achievement. Together we did it!

What Lies Ahead

Now that we've submitted the petition, the next step is to gather an additional 33,000 signatures (the requisite number is 15,000) to submit on September 4th and thereby force the initiative onto the ballot in the event that the City Council fails to take action or votes against including it on the ballot. Meanwhile, the City will have 30 days starting today to review the petition and certify whether it contains at least 30,000 valid signatures and complies with all the requirements of the law. As stated before, the petition was carefully crafted by top election attorneys to withstand a legal challenge. If the City challenges the petition - and we believe there's a possibility it will not - we are confident of overcoming that challenge in court. Should a lawsuit be necessary, it will likely run into late August or September, at which time we will know once and for all if we are on the ballot.

One Last Push

To gather the additional 33,000 signatures, we now need to raise the final $60,000 of the $250,000 fundraising goal we set out at the beginning of this campaign - and quickly. September 4th is the deadline to submit the second petition; however, we hope to finish petitioning by the end of July to avoid incurring additional costs. Therefore, our goal is to raise the final $60,000 by July 20th.

If you have not yet contributed, or if you are in a position to contribute again, please consider making a contribution on this holiday weekend (well, for those of us in the U.S. it's a holiday) by going to HighRiseSafetyNYC.org and selecting the contribution amount that works for your budget.

Once again, thank you to everyone who has contributed and helped spread the word. It is because of your commitment and determination that we have made it this far.

Thank you for your generous support.