Jewelers of America announced June 17
the expansion of its legislative advocacy capabilities to include state
legislation tracking and state action campaigns on its website.

The new State
Legislation Tracking Center – located in the “Legislation & Regulation”
section – allows visitors to track legislative issues that could affect jewelry
businesses, by issue topic or state. Currently, the Center monitors two
important legislative issues: sales tax fairness bills and jewelry product-related
bills, like those that limit cadmium or lead in children’s jewelry.

Visitors to the website will see an
interactive map of the U.S. – the highlighted states are those with legislation
JA is currently monitoring. Users can click on those states to see specific
bills, read more information and, in some cases, take action. JA has plans to
expand the Center’s coverage to other important state issues and welcomes input
from industry professionals about state issues that are important to their
businesses.

In addition to the new state tracking
capabilities, JA has expanded its online Legislative Action Center to include
state-focused campaigns. Jewelry businesses can use JA’s pre-written action
alerts and talking points to take action on federal and state issues. The
Center also features a zip code search that helps visitors quickly identify and
contact their state and federal representatives.

The association is also working with the
Manufacturing Jewelers and Suppliers of America in fighting to include fair
measurement standards in state bills that limit levels of cadmium in children’s
jewelry. Several states, including California and New York, have introduced legislation.
Click here to
for more information on this action alert.

JA also launched its second federal
legislative action campaign of the year, asking jewelers to contact their
legislators and push for a full and permanent repeal of the estate tax.

Members and
non-members can visit the Legislative Action Center’s estate tax
action alert page to send
personalized messages to Congress about this issue.

JCK