Michigan Coalition for Progress Announces Growing Support

KALAMAZOO, MI – The Michigan Coalition for Progress (www.miprogresscoalition.org), a new organization launched less than two months ago, today proudly announced that the support they have received from concerned Michiganders shows they have the right message for Michigan's future. The Coalition is providing Michiganders a variety of ways to become involved including cell phone ringtones, text messaging, petitions and the Coalition MySpace page.

"We are overwhelmed by the more than 4,000 people who have signed our petition calling for the election of leaders who will move Michigan forward. There are now more than a twelve hundred people signed onto our MySpace page and who are making their voices heard," said Kerry Ebersole, Michigan Coalition for Progress executive director. "We believe in transparency and being open about who our supporters are, unlike the Republican controlled Working for Michigan's Future. We think they owe it to the voters to come clean about where their money comes from and who is behind their operation."

The Coalition today filed a tri-annual report with the Michigan Secretary of State of State showing $5,174,400 dollars were raised since the Coalition's creation just 69 days ago. The Coalition's transparent funding report is in direct contrast to the Republican controlled Working for Michigan's Future, a 501 (c) 4 organization, which does not disclose their donors and refuses to answer questions about who is really behind their organization.

The Michigan Coalition for Progress was started by Jon Stryker, a Kalamazoo architect, and a philanthropist focused on civil rights has grown into a grassroots organization with support from around the state. The group has registered as a political action committee with the Michigan Secretary of State. The Coalition also supports progressive causes and leaders in other parts of the country in an effort to affect real change for the future of our nation.

The Coalition has launched television and radio ads in markets across Michigan, along with cell phone ringtones and text messaging, spreading the word that Republicans are standing in the way of moving Michigan forward. The ads, ringtones and text messaging take Republicans to task for allowing garbage from Canada and New Jersey to be dumped here in Michigan and that Republicans in the state legislature voted to give tax breaks for companies that outsource local Michigan jobs to China, India, and Singapore.

The Coalition aims to keep Michigan moving forward by electing leaders who understand how important it is to:

• Work together to invest in create new jobs and fix our economy
• Ensure that everyone has access to quality, affordable health care
• Build the best education system in the world
• Preserve our unique and natural environment, and
• Protect diversity and promote tolerance because it makes us stronger and brings out the best in all of us.
• Support stem cell research

"The Coalition for Progress is going to be around for years to come supporting people share our concerns," said Ebersole.