Citizen Action Center

Summary

Take Action: HB 1500 Undermines Education Options for Pennsylvania Families

State lawmakers should be working to ensure that every family has access to the best educational opportunities for their children. In today’s dynamic educational landscape, parents have more options than ever, including a growing interest in cyber charter schools.

Empowering parents to choose the educational environment that best fits their child is a winning solution.

Unfortunately, Pennsylvania is falling behind in expanding education options. Instead of supporting student-centered policies, some lawmakers are pushing legislation that would limit choice and reduce access to educational opportunities.

House Bill 1500 would unfairly target cyber charter schools. The proposed bill would slash their funding by 40% and cap tuition at just $8,000 per student, one-third of the funding currently spent on students in traditional public schools ($23,000). These cuts would undermine a vital public school option and strip families of the ability to choose what works best for their children.

Cyber charter schools are growing because they meet needs that many district schools do not. Tens of thousands of students—many from low-income or underserved communities—are thriving in cyber schools that offer flexible, personalized education. When parents have the freedom to choose, students succeed.

Contact your State Representative and State Senator today. Urge them to oppose House Bill 1500 and stand up for school choice and opportunities for all Pennsylvania families.

Summary

Every year, Planned Parenthood and the abortion industry rake in hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer funding, all while ending hundreds of thousands of innocent lives and harming vulnerable women. Your tax dollars are helping fund the largest abortion business in the nation: Planned Parenthood. 

They performed nearly 400,000 abortions last year alone—more than the population of Pittsburgh—and received over $699 million in taxpayer funding. That’s nearly $2 million every single day flowing to a business that profits from taking unborn lives.

Even worse, Planned Parenthood and Big Abortion funnel that money into lobbying for radical abortion policies, backing extremist candidates, and fighting against common-sense protections for women and children. Meanwhile, real women’s health providers—like pregnancy resource centers—are saving lives and offering compassionate, holistic care with little to no taxpayer support.

But it gets worse! This past week, Live Action released a troubling undercover report: Planned Parenthood clinics across the country are fast-tracking vulnerable minors into receiving cross-sex hormones, often in a single virtual visit. No therapy. No mental health evaluations. Just a quick appointment and a prescription for powerful, body-altering, permanently damaging drugs.

Pennsylvanians deserve better. Women deserve better. Children deserve better. Taxpayers deserve better.

It’s time to say: No more public funds for abortion providers. Our government should not be in the business of bankrolling abortions and cross-sex hormones for minors. 

🔹 Nearly 60% of Americans oppose taxpayer-funded abortion, including a third of Democrats and a majority of Independents.
🔹 Planned Parenthood commits nearly 40% of all abortions in the U.S.
🔹 There are far better ways to support women in need, without ending innocent lives.

Congress must defund Planned Parenthood now. Not one more child, born or preborn, should be harmed.

➡️ Urge your federal lawmakers: Stop sending our tax dollars to Planned Parenthood and the abortion industry. Defund Big Abortion.

Make your voice heard today. Use the form below to contact your U.S. Congressman and US Senators now.

Summary

Parents want more options when it comes to their child’s education. More options help children because education is not a one-size-fits-all.

The Pennsylvania Award for Student Success (PASS) scholarship program, Senate Bill 10, led by prime sponsor Sen. Judy Ward, will make scholarships available to families living in the Commonwealth’s lowest-achieving school districts. This is one option that aims to help children who live in failing school districts. These scholarships can directly help families in Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, and elsewhere in Pennsylvania, where school districts fall in the bottom 15 percent of performance metrics based on state testing. 

Students who live within the attendance area of a low-achieving school deserve access to educational alternatives like PASS Scholarships, which may be used towards various educational needs, including tuition, fees, and textbooks.

PASS Scholarships would directly fund students, helping families with children in the lowest-rated school districts choose a school where that child can thrive. There is built-in accountability because we know that ultimately, parents know which schools best serve the needs of their children.

Parents know their children best. Parents should have the right to choose where their children attend school, and we should empower more parents to provide their children with a better solution for success in education.

Summary

Right now in the Pennsylvania legislature, there is an all-out push to legalize marijuana for recreational use in Pennsylvania—setting up the government to profit from more addictive use of industrialized high potency drugs. HB1200 just passed in the Pennsylvania House – this legislation would create a predatory industry that prioritizes profit over public health. It would hinder local authority and grow government by charging the Liquor Control Board to oversee advertising and licensing of state-sanctioned marijuana stores.

What’s at stake:

• Communities lose control: Local residents would have a short window to meet petition qualifications and have a judge stop a pot shop from your neighborhood —and the ruling can’t be appealed.

   

• Government expansion: The state Liquor Control Board takes charge of licensing, ads, and sales.

   

• High-potency marijuana legalized: No limit on the THC potency of marijuana concentrates—linked to addiction and mental health crises.

   

• Home-grow allowed: Up to four plants per household, with vague security rules.

   

We must not follow the same failed path as other states. Where commercialized marijuana is legal, we’ve seen:

• More children in hospitals after THC exposure

   

• A rise in youth psychosis, addiction, and depression

   

• Increased drug-impaired traffic fatalities

   

• Growing strain on law enforcement and workplaces

• A black market that continues to thrive

“Our son was bright and full of potential. After years of high-potency THC use, he drowned during a mental health episode. Had he never used marijuana, we believe he’d be alive today.” — Jeff & Patti Weaver, Allegheny County

State officials should not be incentivized by addiction. For every $1 in marijuana tax revenue, states like Colorado face over $4.50 in social and economic costs. That’s why major organizations oppose recreational marijuana legalization—including the American Academy of Pediatrics, PA Fraternal Order of Police, PA Chiefs of Police Association, and Christian Medical and Dental Associations.

TAKE ACTION: Tell Your Legislators: Say NO to Marijuana Legalization for Recreational Use

Summary

Chemical abortions make up over half of all abortions in Pennsylvania (56% in 2023), not only aborting thousands of unborn children every year but putting thousands of women at serious medical risk. A recent groundbreaking study reveals that one in 10 women taking the abortion pill (mifepristone) suffer severe complications—including life-threatening infections, hemorrhages, or sepsis—at rates drastically higher than previously reported by the FDA. 

Taking the findings in this study, it would mean more than 2,000 women in Pennsylvania suffer complications from the abortion pill every year.

As Pennsylvania’s largest statewide pro-family public policy organization, the Pennsylvania Family Council advocates for public policies that enable children, families, and society to flourish. Join Pennsylvania Family Council in urging federal policymakers to immediately revoke approval of the abortion pill and prioritize women’s health and safety.