July 2014 Joint National Grassroots Conference Call Notes
Dr. Joanne Carter, Executive Director
Welcome everyone to our July RESULTS national conference call—it’s a special call because it is one of the times in the year when we have a joint call with our US Poverty and Global Poverty activists together on the phone.
A special welcome to those of you joining the call for the first time—we’re thrilled to have you! I hope that a number of our young leaders who came to the RESULTS international conference as part of our REAL Change fellowship program are on the call today.
It was really wonderful to be with so many of you at the RESULTS International Conference for so many reasons.
Our collective presence on the Hill matters a lot. We were able to gain important new supporters and build the base for our work on the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit—the most important programs we have for moving families out of poverty in this country. Strategized with key Hill leaders on how important that support was.
And you built support for the innovative asset building strategy for low-income families in the Financial Security Credit legislation—I’m not sure you realize how uniquely placed you are and how important your particular voices are. These are complex issues and there are so few grassroots organizations and constituents that can offer the kind of knowledge that you bring—knowledge that was made real and tangible and moving with real life stories that many of you shared.
And the conference and Hill meetings were perfectly timed as a powerful launch of our global campaign for the next seven months on accelerating the end of preventable child deaths on the planet—with a centerpiece of that campaign our ask for a bold $1 billion US pledge to the GAVI Alliance so that we can do our part to help poor countries immunize 300 million of their children and thereby prevent 5-6 million child deaths. Dr. Seth Berkley the head of GAVI made it a point to get to our conference because he knows how central your role will be for this effort.
And this funding for GAVI is just a part of a bigger campaign—the day after our conference lobby day, the administrator of USAID, Raj Shah, convened a meeting with many of the ministers of health of the 24 countries with the greatest burdens of child deaths to explore together what it would take to achieve the end preventable child and maternal deaths by 2030. And he also announced that USAID was in the process of reallocating some $2.9 B of funding to have even greater impact and that this could save an additional half a million children’s lives, and also instituting other key reform measures. I had the privilege to be part of a panel over the last nine months that supported this process and it’s the most exciting reform and strengthening effort I have seen in decades. We’re exploring how our advocacy can support this going forward.
At the International Conference, I was particularly excited to see SO MANY new people—including the hundred young leaders in our REAL Change Fellowship program who will be working with us all year—and hopefully beyond. They brought amazing energy and creativity to the conference. And I am very grateful to so many of you who have been in RESULTS for years or decades—who supported new folks so generously and so well. It was also so great to have our allies from Circles and from Feminine Power and AMSA and Partners in Health—each of whom who bring so much depth to our work and also offer opportunities for even bigger partnerships going forward.
And I was also inspired to see many new international partners including grassroots partners from Africa who are using the RESULTS model in their own countries. And the new RESULTS in formation in South Korea. They were so incredibly energized and full of new ideas coming out of the conference.
I think we also have significant opportunities to build even stronger relationships and work together with many of our speakers. Many of our speakers were there because they know how key your work is to issues they care about, but I also heard from a number of them how impressed they were with you, and I think we’ve opened even bigger opportunities—with Tavis Smiley and his 4-year tour, with Marian Wright Edelman, With Sean Astin. With Jim Kim and helping shape what the Bank does.
I’ll end with three things:
1. We really want your ideas about how to build on the IC and how to keep the spirit of the conference that you created alive throughout the year. We welcome your ideas on the listserv and to the staff.
2. My one regret for the conference is that we didn’t have even more people there who could have benefited from being with all of you and added to our collective impact. We need to keep growing this organization and offer the opportunity of personal power and political impact to others. Please let us know of people you know in other states or districts who want to get involved. And we will follow-up with all of you to seek contacts in the states and districts we’re targeting right now.
3. Finally, we know that face to face meetings with constituents are the single most effective strategy identified by congressional staff to influence members. So while many of you did have FTF meetings at the IC, many did not and the August recess (especially in an election year) is the best time to get those meetings—so please be reaching out now to get meetings in the district in August. There’s nothing more powerful to move our issues and engage your partners.
Thank you for everything you do.
International Conference Shares, including share about REAL Change Fellowship
*To hear all of the great shares mentioned in these notes and featured during the call, go to our podcast of the call:
http://www.results.org/skills_center/results_national_conference_calls/
And stay tuned for continuing information on the unfolding year for the REAL Change Fellows around the country. They are off and running!
______
Legislative Updates – Meredith Dodson, Director of U.S. Poverty Campaigns and John Fawcett, Global Poverty Legislative Director
U.S. Poverty:
Fabulous work already this year with Congress on expanding economic mobility in America, urging them to protect and expand the Earned Income Tax Credit(EITC), Child Tax Credit(CTC), andFinancial Security Credit.
· For those who don’t know, engaging in tax policy is critical for those interested in ending poverty and, in particular, addressing the wealth gap.
· Overall, lift approximately 10 million Americans out of poverty, including 5 mil children
· EITC is most effective program in combatting child poverty
· Despite the success of the EITC and CTC, important improvements to these credits will expire in 2017, which would lead to 12 million people, including 7 million children, falling into poverty or deeper into poverty.
· Given that this is an election year, critical time period to push for specific tax policies that will move us towards ending poverty in the United States – to make sure there is momentum now for when Congress negotiates tax reform proposals.
Keep following up, specifically with to get more cosponsors for S. 836, H.R. 769, and H.R. 2116.
· Just yesterday, on Capitol Hill and met with the aide in Senator Brown’s office who is the point person on the – reported that hearing from other offices as a result of your meetings.
Make your August recess meetings even more effective by engaging “real experts” on poverty – those who have experienced poverty firsthand – to share personal stories.
· Stories are up to 22 times more memorable than facts or figures alone.
· Got to see the real impact of people sharing their stories and making this real for policymakers:
· Love this recap from one of our new RESULTS members in the new Indianapolis US poverty group – who is also a Circles Leader, so he is working with local allies to move out of poverty
· … I enjoyed myself tremendously I can say that this was the most awesome thing I have ever done! I tribute this to all of you, I hope that I can do this again I had so much fun with all of you. I now know that my voice can be heard! I spent most of my life believing that I didn't matter I am so proud of all of you and am determined to share my experience with others so that they know that they are just as important as anyone else on "The Hill" as long as they speak out about the things that are important to them and use their own life story. We can all be powerful tools in affective change in our Country!
· Potential allies to contact:Circles USA affiliates,Witnesses to Hunger,Community Action agencies, localVoluntary Income Tax Assistance (VITA) programs, food banks and food pantries, Head Start programs, faith communities, etc.
Global Poverty:
Global Partnership for Education pledging conference in Brussels June 26 –
o U.S. pledged $40 m for FY14 and $50 m for FY15
o This sets an upward trend precedent
o Advocates generated over 100 pieces of media on GPE. Keep the relationships with your editors going, even if they didn’t write!
o Comprehensive analysis on our blog: http://www.results.org/blog/an_update_from_brussels_the_gpe_pledging_conference/
GAVI Campaign on vaccines – pledging conference to be held in early 2015
o Goal: $7.5 billion pledged overall. This would get 300 million additional kids vaccinated and save 5-6 million lives. An estimated $80-$100 billion in economic benefit.
o So far, the GAVI resolution in the House is getting strong bipartisan leadership for its launch – thank you! We are rolling out a suite of tools for you.
Grassroots Café – Ken Patterson, Director of Global Grassroots Advocacy
I have to tell you, the International Conference was amazing. I talked to folks who were there for the first time and it was like their eyes were opened to a whole other world they didn’t know existed—their sense of their own personal power was totally transformed. I spoke with folks who have been around for years and I heard from a number of them that “it was the best conference I’ve ever been to.” They were re-inspired and re-energized by our speakers, the other advocates, and a chance to go en masse to Capitol Hill. And seeing their members of Congress and aides respond with interest reminded them that we have to be the ones doing this work—there really is nobody else. The fact that the new and experienced advocates can be so inspired by our conference is telling. It says that we still offer something totally unique, inspiring, and transformative to anyone who wants to take a chance with us. It also says that doing this work alone or isolated from each other can be challenging—it says that we really need each other, we need this community to keep ourselves from falling into a state of powerlessness and cynicism that many people live in. It also says that we stand on a sturdy platform of empowerment and that we can throw a rope of opportunity to others and help them pull themselves out of powerlessness and cynicism like every one of us have. Personally, I was inspired and humbled being among the amazing human beings you all are.
There are some really important things we can all be doing after the International Conference to ensure that we are making the most of that experience. Here are the top 4:
IC follow up:
1. Report your meetings with Congress and staff. The reports are an important record of your work and future opportunities, and it’s important to track how well we are doing on taking the most powerful and influential action we can take—meeting with our elected officials. Meeting records help us assess the kind of impact we are having, and also inspires our donors. So far we have 122 domestic meetings reported, and 236 global meetings. We know some are missing. If you have not submitted a report on a meeting, please do so at the link listed in the PPT, the minutes from the call, and the Weekly Update: (http://tinyurl.com/LobbyReportForm).
2. Follow up on the requests you made in Washington, or after the conference from home, until you get an answer. We need to remember that as soon as you leave an office or make a request from home, there’s a good chance your request will get buried under some other request or priority. Unless we help them keep it on top of their to-do pile, it will disappear in their stacks. If you need coaching on your follow up, please contact your grassroots team members - Crickett Nicovich () for global poverty issues and Meredith Dodson () for U.S. poverty issues.
3. Share about your conference experience with others; or if you were not there, ask others to join you in watching recordings of some of the keynote speakers. As I opened this section I talked about how powerful the conference is, so why not share that with others over coffee or simple outreach activity. To tell us how the Gig Harbor, WA folks shared their International Conference experience we have asked Catherine Luria to share.
And this past Thursday, PG County, MD, folks held a small fundraiser where they showed excerpts from Dr. Jim Kim and Dr. Seth Berkley keynote addresses at the IC to their guests. It’s pretty great to be able to let the President of the World Bank say great things about RESULTS instead of having to do that yourself.
If you have other outreach ideas, please share them with each other on the listserv.
4. If you didn’t meet face to face with your representatives and senators while in DC or recently at home, NOW is the time to request face to face meetings for the August recess with the Representatives and Senators. The recess runs from August 4 – September 7, Labor Day, and the earlier we request the meetings, the better. The August recess is the perfect time to continue follow up on your requests from the conference, our move them up the Champion Scale with a bigger request if they’ve already take your action. Our goal in 2014 is to meet face to face with every Representative we cover and 1/3 of the Senators. August is a key moment to meet a first time if you haven’t already this year, or again if you met early in the year. Both the Global and US Poverty Action Sheets for July focus on scheduling face-to-face meetings. It would be powerful to have the request coming from a group of people in your community. Ask your grassroots team staff members for support if you need anything to make these meetings happen.