Fax Josh Shapiro

How to address your fax to Josh Shapiro

By convention, correspondence to a sitting governor is addressed to “The Honorable Josh Shapiro”, with the salutation “Dear Governor Shapiro”.

Why fax rather than mailing a letter

• It arrives in minutes, not days. A letter to the state capitol spends days in transit, and many government offices screen incoming mail before it reaches staff — a fax lands on the office machine the day you send it.
• You know when it arrived. A postmark only proves when you mailed a letter. A completed fax transmission is a timestamped record that the office's machine received your pages.
• Nothing to print, stamp, or mail. A letter needs a printer, an envelope, a stamp, and a trip to the mailbox; a fax goes from your laptop straight to the office's paper tray.

What to include

• One state issue per fax. Reference a specific state bill number or state agency if you have one — offices sort constituent mail by topic, and a one-issue fax is far easier to log under the right topic than a three-issue letter.
• Your name and mailing address. A governor answers to the voters of Pennsylvania; an in-state address signals your position should be counted as a Pennsylvania constituent.
• A clear ask. Sign or veto a bill, direct an agency to act, look into a permitting problem — say what you want Governor Shapiro to do, in one sentence, on one page.

Governor or Congress — where does your issue go?

Josh Shapiro runs Pennsylvania state government: the state budget, state agencies and licensing, Medicaid and state programs, state police and the National Guard, disaster response, pardons, and the veto pen on bills passed by the state legislature. Federal issues — federal taxes, Social Security, immigration, foreign policy — belong to Pennsylvania's two U.S. senators and your U.S. representative. When in doubt, send the state part to the governor and the federal part to Congress.

Frequently asked questions