Grassroots Organizing Key To Advancing Issues
By Jim McLean
KHI News Service
January 8, 2009
Ann Wiesner, a principal with the Minneapolis, Minn.-based firm Grassroots Solutions, speaks to an audience of Kansas advocates in Topeka on Wednesday. Encouraging people to relay their stories to policymakers is a key strength advocates can use to their advantage, she said. (Photo courtesy Sunflower Foundation)
TOPEKA — Nonprofit groups attempting to persuade policymakers need to organize and mobilize people if they want to be effective when going up against the money power of private-sector interest groups, a grassroots organizing expert told Kansas advocates Wednesday.
Ann Wiesner, a principal with the Minneapolis, Minn.-based firm Grassroots Solutions, spoke to more than 100 representatives of nonprofit organizations at a Topeka event sponsored by the Sunflower Foundation.
“There are two kinds of power,” Wiesner said. “One comes from money, the other comes from people.”
People power can’t always level the playing field, but it can be effective when used to put decision makers in touch with constituents directly affected by a policy, Wiesner said.
“You not only have strength in numbers, you have strength in numbers of people who have stories to tell,” she said.
Wiesner, whose firm conducts campaigns for ballot initiatives, public-policy changes and get-out-the-vote efforts, talked about the five most common mistakes that nonprofit advocates make and provided some tips for how to overcome them. She said organizations directly affected by the decisions made by policymakers too often don’t see policy and politics as a part of their missions. She said misunderstandings about what political activities nonprofits can safely engage in sometimes causes them to be too timid.
“Grassroots inherently involves agitation,” she said. “That means people are going to get agitated. You’ve got to kind of get with that. Discomfort is what precedes change.”
Wiesner was the second of four nationally-known speakers invited to Kansas by the Sunflower Foundation to take part in an initiative aimed at increasing the capacity of the foundation’s grantees and other nonprofit organizations to influence changes in health policy. Billie Hall, Sunflower’s president and chief executive officer, has said she hopes that the initiative will help participants “become powerful voices for the Kansans they serve.”
Wiesner urged all organizations — regardless of their size — to have clear priorities and plans for how to achieve them. She said it doesn’t always take hundreds of people speaking out to get the attention of policymakers. Often a small letter-writing campaign can be effective.
“Five letters is a firestorm,” she said. “Because guess what folks, a lot of people aren’t participating in the democratic process.”
Mary Jane Hellebust, executive director of the Tobacco Free Kansas Coalition and one of the nonprofit advocates who came to hear Wiesner, said she hopes to utilize the power of her members to increase funding for tobacco control programs and to win passage of a statewide indoor smoking ban and a tax increase on cigarettes and tobacco products.
“They’ve got the money,” Hellebust said, referring to the tobacco industry. “But we’ve got the passion and the science on our side.”
Susan Dentzer, health correspondent for the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer and an editor for the journal Health Affairs, is the next speaker in the Sunflower series. She is scheduled to appear in Topeka on March 18. Andy Goodman, a public interest communications specialist, is scheduled to conclude the series in Wichita on May 20.
-Jim McLean is a staff writer for KHI News Service, which specializes in coverage of health issues facing Kansans. He can be reached at jmclean@khi.org or at 785-233-5443, ext. 110.
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