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 Advice to advocates
The Conservation Leaders
Network is the new source for "A Guide to Engaging
Allied Voices," a manual for environmental advocates we helped
create in 2005.
Click here to
see how to request your copy.
As Gideon Rosenblatt writes in “Movement as Network,”
“The story of the environmental movement over the next quarter
century is about building relationships with the outermost circle of
sympathetic citizens. It is about engaging the “environmental
majority” and building the deep societal commitment to
sustainability that will protect our world for generations to
come.” Pro-environment county officials are key
to engaging the public and the Conservation Leaders Network
is key to making this happen.
Our counties play a key
role in shaping natural resource policy at the local, state and
national level. Whether it is dealing with climate change,
federal forest management, clean water, wildlife, the Endangered
Species Act, or other natural resource issues, counties across the
nation individually and collectively make decisions and lobby on
critical environmental questions.
But many county
commissioners, especially in rural counties, are operating with an
"under siege" mentality. They feel isolated. Too often we work
hard to get them elected, and then we walk away from them once we
get them in office. We need to look at a successful election
as the beginning of our work, just as the elected officials look at
the election as the beginning of their real job.
The election, and all
the work that led up to it, are just the preliminaries. The
elected officials still need the supportive letters-to-the-editor;
they still need you to attend and speak out at important meetings.
If you aren't there, who do you think your elected officials are
going to hear from? They hear from the people who have a
financial interest in their decision. Those folks are loud and
clear. They keep in close contact with the people to whom they gave
campaign contributions. They know that it is important to pack
a meeting. They know that elected officials are swayed by the
appearance of public support or opposition. And when your
elected officials feel isolated from those who supported them during
the campaign, and are surrounded by those who oppose them, it is
easy to rationalize that this one vote won't make much difference
(especially if the vote expresses a minority opinion), or to choose
not to take on any more controversial issues: in other words,
to go along to get along.
Like it or not, your
local elected officials have a lot more clout than you do. If
you can get them to adopt your position, your success is much more
likely. What cover will you provide for elected officials to follow
your lead? Below are suggestions gleaned from the experience
of the Executive Director of the Conservation Leaders Network, a
former county commissioner in rural Oregon, and the experiences of a
variety of decision-makers who have participated in trainings,
workshops and panel presentations on the topic organized by the
Conservation Leaders Network over the last several years. We
are not so naïve as to think that following these suggestions
guarantees your success. But we can guarantee that you
will increase your chances of success by taking our advice.
You need to make it easy for the elected official to support your
side. All of this advice is geared to achieving that
goal. It needs to be easier for them to do what you want
rather than what your opponents want.
What follows is our
specific advice for working with local elected
officials:
-
Organize.
This is so important it has to be
first. Think about what you want to accomplish, what
decision you want from a local elected official, what their time
lines are, what kind of public support they need to take the
position you want and what you can actually provide. Have
conversations with your allies about which of you has the best
relationship with which decision-maker, who will approach whom
when, what you have to offer. Sharing information and
insights among yourselves can often be the key to
success.
- Appeal to the
decision-makers' self-interest.
Think about what the benefit to the
county as a whole or the county commissioner as an individual is
by supporting your position. Why should the county take the
position you want them to take? Will it save tax
dollars? Will it increase efficiency? Economic
arguments can be the most influential, even for environmental
issues.
- Create a political
presence.
Sometimes just say hello. You don't
have to expound an opinion on everything.
-
Be
credible.
Never, ever lie. Never
fudge. If you don't know the answer, admit it. Then
tell the decision-makers that you will find out and get back to
them. You will never be able to influence decision-makers if
they know they can't count on your word.
- Elect your own
people.
Success
at influencing decision-makers requires that there be
decision-makers who can be influenced, who are responsive to their
constituents, who are independent thinkers and who want to do what
they believe is in the public interest. If your elected
officials are controlled by resource-extraction industry
interests, it is unlikely that you will ever prevail. You
would be better off focusing your energies on the next
election. Get involved in the campaigns of candidates who
are good on your issues.
- Be
confident; don't be afraid to teach and learn; be fair and
sincere.
- Have honest goals and
principles, but flexible positions.
This means that it is important to
differentiate between your overarching principles and goals and
the positions you take to achieve them. Positions are
negotiable, goals and principles are not. See also,
below: focus on interests not
positions.
- Convert a staff
person.
As a
volunteer, you probably can't work on your important issues every
day. Convert an agency staff person to your point of view;
they are paid to work on your issues every day. Having them
on your side also adds credibility to your point of
view.
- Everybody has to see a future and that
includes your opponents.
This idea can be difficult. It's
one thing to recognize intellectually that there is value in
accomplishing this and yet another thing to get motivated to
develop something that benefits your opponents, who may have been
personally antagonistic in the past. But if you can
demonstrate that what you are proposing includes something for
your opposition, you can provide every politician's dream--a
win-win situation.
- Compliment and thank
decision-makers when they do good things.
Decision-makers, especially local
elected officials, usually hear from constituents only when they
have a complaint. The roads have pot holes; the planning
commission is making poor decisions; they shouldn't have cut the
funding for some favored project; they shouldn't have missed a
particular meeting. Newspapers sell controversy; negative
headlines and editorials are more common than positive ones.
A quick phone message or a brief letter to the editor
complimenting the decision-maker can have a big impact on that
decision-maker's attitude and their perception of you. Give
positive feedback.
- Don't
be in touch only when you have something to complain
about.
- Develop a
relationship.
Developing a relationship begins with a
simple meeting to introduce yourself, letting the decision-maker
know the issues important to you, and offering to provide the
decision-maker with information and support on those issues.
If you were involved in their campaign for election, so much the
better. Every couple of months, make sure you have some
contact with the decision-maker. It can be a phone message
left on their answering machine thanking them for a position they
took on an issue (and it does not have to be an environmental
issue). It can be a supportive letter to the editor.
It can be a quick hand-shake at a town hall or other public
meeting.
- See the decision-maker as a
partner.
Try to envision your role as that
of a helper. You are trying to help the decision-maker
come to a decision that will be beneficial to you. Involve
them early on. Let them know what problems you anticipate
and how you are trying to solve them. Instead of being yet
another demanding constituent who is going to be unhappy no matter
what the decision is, you want to be seen as a reasonable person
who is perceived as an equal, trying his or her best to bring the
situation to a good resolution.
- Don't expect the
decision-maker to pass your personal political litmus
test.
Opinions
on environmental issues cross many boundaries. It is a
mistake to think that a decision-maker won't be good on a
conservation issue because they are on the opposite side of the
choice issue, for example. Or because they are members of a
certain political party and you are not. Focus on the issue
at hand, and let all the other issues on which you don't see
eye-to-eye fall by the wayside.
- Match activists' skills and
talents.
Environmental advocates at times waste
their limited resources competing among themselves. What
strategy is best? Litigation? Confrontation?
Politics? Civil disobedience? The truth is there is
room for everyone and every strategy. Rather than spending
your energy trying to convince others that yours is the only
viable strategy, support a strategy that allows everyone who is
willing to be involved to do so in the manner they
choose.
- Focus on interests rather
than positions.
Interests are more general and more
basic than positions. Your interest may be protecting the
biodiversity of our remaining forest lands. Your position
may be that a certain initiative should be passed. Unless
your immediate goal is to gain support for the initiative, you
will be better able to achieve protection of the biodiversity of
our remaining forest lands by looking at the larger picture when
working with local decision-makers. It allows you to look at
a range of options, see below.
- Remember that you are not
performing for the audience--you are performing for the
decision-maker.
Face the decision-makers when
testifying or speaking at a public meeting. If you are using
visual aids, have them face the decision-makers, not the
audience. Make eye contact with the
decision-makers.
- Speak out so the
decision-maker can then speak in support of your
view.
It is
important to speak at public meetings, even if you don't think you
will prevail. By expressing your point of view, you are
offering political cover for the decision-maker who you hope will
support your position. This tactic will allow that
decision-maker to acknowledge his or her agreement and shows that
he or she is not simply operating on a personal agenda, but is
representing some portion of his or her constituency.
-
Have a citizen say a
controversial thing rather than expect the elected official say
it.
Don't
expect your elected official to take a leadership role on every
controversial issue that comes along. If you want an issue
addressed, then you need to accept some of the
responsibility. It is too easy for the opposition to
marginalize the elected official who champions all the tough
issues. It is too easy for the press to suggest that that
official is nothing more than a troublemaker rather than the
problem solver you know him or her to be.
-
Give a range of
options.
See
"focus on interests rather than positions" above. Be sure
you support the entire range of options you are proposing.
You may favor some over others, but each option you suggest must
be an improvement--from your point of view--over the status
quo.
- Be brief and to the
point.
You
don't need to read your written testimony aloud unless you think
the decision-makers aren't going to look at it. Just touch
on the high points. Similarly, if there are twenty of you at
a public meeting, don't have everyone say the same thing.
The decision-makers will tune everything out and resent you for
wasting their time. You have at least two options. The
best option occurs when there are enough material and perspectives
that you are able to arrange each of the twenty to speak from
their own experience in support of your issue without
repetition. Another alternative is to have one or two main
speakers who will then ask everyone who shares their point of view
to stand up to demonstrate public support.
- Know the
system.
You
need to know what the process is for the decision-maker whom you
are trying to influence. Is it a quasi-judicial process with
specific opportunities for public comment? Are private
conversations with the decision-maker allowed? Will there be
a workshop session which allows the decision-makers to discuss the
issue in an informal setting? Can you appeal the
decision? If so, to whom can you appeal and what are the
timelines? Is it a budget matter subject to a specific
deadline?
- Don't use
jargon.
It can
be difficult not to lapse into the use of acronyms, nicknames and
abbreviations. But you will lose your listener if they are
not as informed as you. Most elected officials are not going
to want to demonstrate for public consumption that they don't know
what you are talking about.
- No
surprises.
If
you have been working with a decision-maker and you know you are
going to have to take a public position which is going to cause
problems for that decision-maker, let them know ahead of
time. If you receive new information that may change the
direction you or the decision-maker has been going, warn
them. Even a few minutes advance knowledge before you make a
public announcement can allow the decision-maker to factor it
in.
- Don't put decision-makers on
the spot publicly.
See "no surprises" above.
Additionally, you will not gain brownie points by putting the
decision-maker in an uncomfortable position. Remember that
what you are trying to do is make the decision-maker want to
please you. If you have another agenda, you probably aren't
trying to influence that particular person.
- Don't attack
staff.
Local
decision-makers tend to identify with their staff. They may
have hired them; the staff may have helped familiarize the
decision-maker with their department and their issues; in any
event, they spend a lot of time together. On occasion,
criticism may be necessary. If so, criticize the action, not
the person.
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