In one of their first acts of 2019, the U.S. House voted 418-12 to create a Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress. This bipartisan 12-member committee has the best opportunity in decades to begin to fix Congress, if its members are up for the challenge.

The committee has an opportunity to tackle deep institutional problems that are standing in the way of ensuring that Congress responds to the concerns of the American people.

Among the reforms the committee should explore are:

• Systemic barriers preventing lawmakers from developing subject-matter expertise, such as spending nearly half their days raising money for re-election.

• How committee chairs are selected. Often the process leaves out those with the greatest experience in favor of lawmakers who toe the party line or who have the ability to raise millions of dollars.

• Recruiting and retaining staff. Capitol Hill staff often leave Congress due to low pay to join higher-paying K Street lobbying firms. The committee must examine barriers to retaining staff.

• Reviving the Office of Technology Assessment that was defunded in the 1990s and would help bring the U.S. House into the 21st century, equip it with nonpartisan analysis, and advise it on current and emerging technologies and their impacts on the economy.

Stand with Issue One and sign the petition to the Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress today! Tell them to not get bogged down in “small ball” fixes. Instead they must develop real changes that allow Congress to do its job.