ESCA
has launched a grassroots email campaign to build support, and cosponsors, for Senate and House S ESOP legislation. The Senate bill (S.177) was introduced in late-January by Sens. Pat Roberts (R-KS) and Ben Cardin (D-MD) and the House version (H.R. 2258) was introduced a few weeks ago by a bipartisan group of Ways and Means Members led by Reps. Ron Kind (D-WI) and Jason Smith (R-MO).
We are asking ESCA member companies to engage their employee-owners to email their legislators to encourage them to cosponsor the bills. The process is fast, easy, and straight forward and the grassroots email campaign can be accessed by clicking this link: https://esca.us/take-action/advocacy/#/. The link is live on ESCA's website (esca.us) and can also be accessed under the Advocacy Tab.
Participants simply need to click the Take Action button and enter his/her street address and zip code. The system will automatically populate three email templates (two Senate emails, and one House email) that the participant can personalize (if desired) by adding 1-2 sentences on what working at an S ESOP company means to them. Once the contact information is entered, and the email is customized, the participant only needs to press Send for their emails to be sent to their Member of Congress. The email campaign includes different versions of the email for Members that already are bill cosponsors.
We encourage all ESCA companies to participate in this grassroots campaign in whatever way works best for your company – by sharing the link to targeted groups or widely to all employee-owners.
These grassroots efforts have proven effective in building cosponsors and support for ESCA's legislative efforts. The goal of this campaign is to have a high volume of emails sent to Member offices, which makes them more likely to sign onto ESCA's legislation. Grassroots email campaigns, in addition to ESCA's ongoing advocacy efforts through meetings in Washington and back home, help socialize, educate, and build support for S ESOP policies in Congress.
As a reminder, both S. 177 and H.R. 2258, would promote and grow the number of employee-owned companies in America by:
- Incentivizing owners of S corporations to sell their stock to an ESOP;
- Providing needed technical assistance for companies that may be interested in forming an S ESOP;
- Ensuring small businesses that become ESOPs retain their SBA certification; and
- Affirming the importance of preserving the S ESOP structure in the Internal Revenue Code.
- Encourage the flow of bank capital to ESOP-owned S corporations. (House Only)
Again the grassroots email campaign can be be accessed through the following link: https://esca.us/take-action/advocacy/#/.
