PMIWG Communications Committee Meeting – 3/16

Attendees: Susan Marshall; Debra Brown; Sherry Vogel; Cecil Daniels; Shirley Mason; Sonia Guior

MARCH CALL - Agenda

  1. Special Topic Briefs for Tribes
  2. State Level Communication Issues – Strategy Development
  3. Hero Stories
  4. Technical Brief – Shortcut to LVL
  5. May Teleconference
  6. April Newsletter – Progress Update
  7. Setup for May Call
  1. Special Topic Briefs for Tribes
  • Susan thanked Shirley and Sherry for their work preparing the Communication Group notification to the tribal grantees.
  • The Group discussed the content of the notification email to the tribes:
  • Invitation to participate in Quarterly Teleconference calls
  • Special topic brief –“How to create a CSV file”
  • Communication GroupTimeline document prepared by Cecil
  • FebruaryNewsletter
  • Sherry and Shirley will send this notification out to tribes soon.
  1. State Level Communication Issues – Strategy Development
  • The Communications Group discussed the state-level communication issues between LIHEAP directors and other staff working with data (LIHEAP coordinators). The Work Group has proposed having the Communications sub-group develop a strategy to better target communications.
  • Group discussed a potential strategy, which would involve reaching out to states to create a complete listserv of LIHEAP staff.
  • Susan commented that when she previously mailed out the newsletter using the NEADA listserv, she received many bounce back emails. She fears that employees change so quickly that this kind of bounce back would increase and worsen if subgrantees were involved.
  • Sherry noted that sometimes a grantee will email her and ask to add a staff member to the existing listerv, which might work well as opposed to adding all subgranteesen masse.
  • Susan noted that as some staff leave, they will need to be removed. It may be necessary to have each grantee office inform the Communications Group of any staff changes in order to remove those staff from the listserv. In addition, grantees could inform Communications of which staff to add.
  • Sherry proposed that an email be sent to grantees, requesting a response that includes a list of important staff who are involved with the program (and who should be included in an email blast).
  • Cecil mentioned that he had experience with this – had asked each agency who should be receiving these higher level LIHEAP communications.
  • The group agreed that this would be a good way to proceed in the future.

Action Items:

  • Group will send out an email to grantees, requesting a list of important staff who are involved with the program (and who should be included in PMIWG communications)
  1. Hero Stories
  • The group discussed whether Hero Stories should be the responsibility of the Process, Data, or Communications groups. Susan updated the group on a call with Heather.
  • Heather is looking for “smaller versions” of hero stories – for example, a story in which an individual successfully found data that was needed to complete a task.
  • The group agreed that this effort should be the combined work of the Communications, Process, and Data teams all working together.
  • Susan also reported that it would be useful to highlight individuals that have been successful finding things on the LVL or who have utilized the data warehouse.
  • Other group members agreed with this approach.

Action Items:

  • Group will reach out to individuals who may have had successful experiences with the LVL or utilizing the data warehouse.
  1. Technical Brief – Shortcut to LVL
  • Susan emailed APPRISE about a shortcut to the LVL (LIHEAP Virtual Library), and received a response from Dan Bausch at APPRISE. Dan said he would try to create an article about this.
  • Other Communications group members agreed this would be very helpful.

Action Items:

  • APPRISE will work on drafting an article on accessing the LIHEAP Virtual Library
  1. May Teleconference
  • Susan provided the Group witha list of guiding questions the group could use for the May Teleconference calls, and asked for feedback. She noted that she is working on expanding the list.
  • Susan asked the group if any members had an opinion on changing the format of the teleconference, or if any members had any questions to add.
  • Cecil mentioned that he had facilitated the calls, and thought these questions would work well for future calls. He noted that he thought the questions would help people visualize their own state’s issues/data reporting as a result of these questions.
  • The group recommended that a speaker should be chosen based on their successful use of data for reporting or evaluating progress. The group acknowledged that many states have not yet successfully used data, so therefore those that have could act as role-model states and could inspire others to use data in new ways.
  • Susan mentioned that Trayvon from APPRISE had sent her a list of the states that were able to report on the PM’s. 10 states were successfully able to report, 9 reported prevention and restoration measures, and 8 reported on energy burden.
  • Susan emailed these states with several questions-
  • “What kinds of barriers did you run into?”
  • “What did you learn?”
  • “Are you making any changes as a result of your data?”
  • The group noted that some states had to extend the deadline for their PM forms due to the changed definition of nominal payments. This could result in additional “success stories” in the near future.
  • The group agreed that it would like to hear from states that successfully used data, but also are relatively new in regards to presenting at teleconferences. Some states have been identified as “overused” for speaking engagements on various calls, so it would be preferable to reach out to a successful state that often does not speak at conferences.

Action Items:

  • Group will reach out to individuals who have used data successfully – based on the list provided by Trayvon from APPRISE. Susan will follow up with these states regarding the questions she sent previously.
  1. April Newsletter – Progress Update
  • Susan updated the group on the newsletter progress with an attachment.
  • The group agreed the progress was good – group members found articles relatable, and particularly liked Shirley’s article about weatherization and how it affects home energy usage.
  • Susan informed Shirley that the final article is due at the end of March, Shirley will submit it before then.
  • The group discussed the newsletter, which will be sent out at the end of April, ideally the middle of the 3rd week. This will give more time for grantees to read the newsletter before the call at the end of the month.
  • Debra noted that March 31st (next webinar) is a holiday for California as well as 7 other states – it is Cesar Chavez Day.
  • Comments on current state of the newsletter:
  • Susan is finishing an article with Trayvon, this will be finished by end of March.
  • Three T&TA articles are included from APPRISE.
  • LIHEAP Report Connection was written in December, was edited by Susan to make it more current.
  • Susan thanked Sherry for her excellent editing. Sherry noted that she will be on vacation the week of April 4th.
  • Shirley will submit final copy of her article by the end of March.
  1. Setup for May Call
  • APPRISE has set up the GoToWebinar for the May Teleconference call, and Trayvon will work with Kristen Hart to draft the notification email for Sherry to send out to grantees prior to the call.