Grassroots Tips

Organizing Churches with Church Contacts

June 10, 2013 by Drew McKissick in Grassroots Tips | Leave a comment

leadership 2So, what are church contacts?  A church contact is someone who serves as a point of contact between their church and outside conservative political groups and activity.

They can help distribute critical and timely information, such as non-partisan voter guides, legislative alerts, legislative scorecards, leadership training, as well as other seasonal political information.

By initiating voter registration drives, petition drives, and offering time-sensitive information, church contacts can help mobilize a large bloc of conservatives to influence the political and legislative process.

The Primary Goals of Church Contacts Are:

1) Identify fellow conservatives in your church

Review a list of the members of your church (via a church directory) and identify those that you know to be conservatives.  Use this information to create a database of identified conservatives for your church.

2) Register individuals in your church to vote

Most churches are little better than the general public when it comes to levels of voter registration.  This makes voter registration a critical function of the church contact, since it’s impossible to be effective in the political system without being registered to vote.

Cross-reference the list of identified conservatives in your church with the county voter registration list to determine who needs to be registered.

3) Keep fellow church members informed

The more informed conservatives are the more effective they can be.  Church contacts should work to provide information about lobbying opportunities, political candidates, ballot issues, petitions, opportunities to get involved in a local political party, as well as how they may be able to participate in other activities you may be planning.

Keep a calendar of important political dates for your area, such as party primaries, general elections, county council or school board meetings, political party meetings, or meetings of other conservative political organizations.

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Remember, politics is cyclical.  Based on which elections are approaching, or what’s happening in Congress, your state legislature or local government, the type of activities a church contacts should focus on will vary.

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Related entries:

(You can find tips like this and much more in my “Grassroots 101: Grassroots Training Series”.)

Five Tools for Conservative Grassroots Organization

May 27, 2013 by Drew McKissick in Grassroots Tips | Leave a comment

grassroots organizationGrassroots organizing is no different than pretty much anything else in life.  If you’re serious about doing anything, you need to make sure you have the right tools to get the job done.

Here’s a handy list of five of the most basic tools you should have at your disposal if you’re going to try and build a grassroots organization at the precinct level that can truly have an impact on the things you care about.

1) A list of all registered voters in your precinct

It’s hard to identify and organize if you don’t know who the registered voters are, (or aren’t), and in order to do that you need a recent copy of the voter registration list for your precinct (or whichever precinct you’re working in).

You can get this from your local election (or voter registration) board.

2) “Prospect” lists

Just like in sales, you make your job of finding the people you’re looking for easier if you have a “warm” list of prospects.

Conservative issue petitions, surveys or membership lists from conservative churches make great “prospect” list for potential conservative activists and voters.  They will make it easier for you to identify registered (and unregistered) conservatives by cross-referencing them with voter registration lists.

The result is that you know who lives in which precincts, and who is registered to vote and you could possibly approach about getting involved in your efforts.  You also find out who isn’t registered, so you can get them registered in the future.

3) Blank voter registration forms

Call your local voter registration office and get copies of your state’s voter registration form, (you may even be able to download it online, depending on where you live). You want enough copies for all of those unregistered conservatives you identified from your “prospect” lists.

If people aren’t registered, they can’t vote.  And if they don’t vote, they don’t count.

4) A map of the precinct

Having a map makes it easier to get an idea of who is where and how to get to them. You should be able to get this from your local planning commission or voter registration office, (or if not, they will probably know where you can).  Try to get one with street lines and names overlaid on it, to make it easier for you to use.

Remember, precincts are the building blocks of all other election districts, so you want to make sure your efforts revolve around individual precincts.

5) A political events calendar

Identifying conservatives and organizing them is one thing, but it is also important to keep them informed.  Set up a calendar to keep track of the dates of party primaries, general elections, special elections, school board, local council elections and meetings, as well as local political party meetings.

Let your people know what’s going on and how they can get involved.

Bottom line: do the basics

This is just a basic list, but that’s the point.  It’s “basic”.  Don’t get too distracted by anything that would keep you from focusing on the basics until you get them done.

(Find out more about grassroots organization in my training series!)

Organizing precincts with precinct captains

May 20, 2013 by Drew McKissick in Grassroots Tips | Leave a comment

precinct captainsAs I have mentioned before, the best way to impact politics is to organize at the precinct level.  And the best way to organize is to put someone in charge.

When it comes to organizing in precincts, that means “precinct captains”.

So what is a precinct captain?  Put simply, a precinct captain is someone who serves as a point of contact between the people in their local neighborhood and outside conservative political groups and activities.

By distributing petitions, getting political information to conservative neighbors, making get-out-the-vote phone calls on or before an Election Day, a precinct captain can mobilize a large bloc of people to influence political and legislative activities.

It is also important to understand that many of the activities of a precinct captain are seasonal.  Depending on what elections are approaching or what’s happening in Congress, your state legislature or local council, your focus and activity levels will vary, but there are some primary goals.

The primary goals of precinct captains

1: Identify Ten Conservative Activists

This is probably the most important job of any precinct captain, because in order to put the meat on the bones of any organization, you need people, and that means identifying others who are willing to help.  Try to identify at least ten.  These will be the people who are the most interested in what you are doing.

The goal is to be able to quickly line up volunteers when a major project comes up and help is needed.  Keep in mind that different people enjoy doing different things.  Make note of what they’re willing to do and use them accordingly.  There will be many different things to do and plenty of work to go around.

2: Identify Other Conservative Voters

Now that a core group of activists has been identified, what should they do? Identify fellow conservatives.  A good goal is to find enough conservative voters to equal 10% of the total number of registered voters in any given precinct.  This is plain, old-fashioned voter identification.

There are any number of ways to go about it, from using issues surveys, petitions, church directories, etc., and cross-referencing that information with voter registration lists.

3: Educate and Mobilize Identified Voters

Once a list of identified conservatives has been put together, the next step is to educate them and get them involved.  This can include distributing voter education materials to them on candidates or ballot issues, making sure that they actually vote on Election Day, or encouraging them to lobby the local school board, council or state legislature on some key issue.

It’s also important to encourage them to get involved in their local Republican Party.  The more solid conservatives we have in GOP grassroots and leadership positions, the better for the conservative movement as a whole.

4: Stay Informed

Finally, a precinct captain’s job is to keep up to date on current and future projects, activities and opportunities for activism – and pass the information on to others.

When you’ve got this kind of organization on a precinct by precinct basis, then you’ve got an infrastructure that can be activated and have an impact on the things you care about when it counts!

(Find out more about precinct captains and local organization in general in my Grassroots Training Series!)

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