For those of you interested in Organizing for America (OFA) activities, I am posting a summary of a call I was on tonight.
Kevin Puleo, the Southwest’s Regional Director for OFA (CO, NM, OK, KS, TX, LA, AR) led a conference call tonight to discuss recent weekend activity. On the call were OFA volunteers, as well as team leaders and staff from the recent Campaign for Change. Kevin said that over 100,000 pledges were collected in the Pledge Project Canvass last weekend, not including pledges made online, or those gathered since Sunday.
The call agenda:
- two volunteers spoke about their respective Pledge Project Canvass experiences last weekend.
- what were the issues – areas needing improvement – with the canvass
- what worked well
- priorities for next 7 days – two weeks.
Here are my notes:
Two volunteers spoke
It sounded to me like the first volunteer from New Orleans had mixed results. She and her fellow volunteers brainstormed about ways to increase pledges. They realized they needed to get educated about the budget before going out and talking to others. She reminded listeners that the White House's website has lots of fact sheets as well as the budget itself online. Her group also came up with the idea of tapping into other social networks to gather pledges. She also added that it’s very important for everyone to be involved locally to advance Obama’s agenda.
The second volunteer, from New Mexico, said people readily signed the pledge because they supported President Obama and wanted him to succeed. He went back into some of the neighborhoods he had worked in during the campaign and some people were pleased to see him still working for Obama and applauded his volunteering.
Areas needing improvement
Kevin said the number one issue for volunteers was the short timeline between announcing the Pledge Project Canvass and the date of the canvass itself. Most volunteers echoed the timeline was too short and there was not enough time to prepare. Kevin wants volunteers to know that issue campaigning is very different from an election campaign. He pointed out that legislation moves quickly and rapid response is critical, and short notice is often inevitable. He asked everyone for their patience.
Other issues – there was confusion regarding the purpose of collecting pledges; there was a lack of understanding of the budget itself; there were too many pages of material to download; and the script was too long. Kevin said all these issues would be addressed and presumably improved in the future.
What worked well
Using known and existing social networks, as the New Orleans volunteer also affirmed, was helpful. Old phone lists from the presidential campaign were put into use with good results. Canvassing in high traffic areas was productive.
What’s next
The next seven days to two weeks are critical, especially the next week. Kevin stressed the need for all of us to continue collecting pledges and to ask that everyone who does sign the pledge, to call their congress people (U.S. Senators and Representatives) and urge their support for Obama’s budget.
Kevin encouraged us to set up our own local phone banks and to use the online tool at my.barackobama.com to make calls around the country. He pointed out that we are being asked to not only build support in our own neighborhood, but also nationally using the my.barackobama.com tool.
He also reminded everyone the need to enter the data that is collected – otherwise the pledges are meaningless to OFA!
He closed by answering the question “What are we building?”
His reply – we’re building support for Obama’s budget and we’re collecting pledges to present to Congress in two weeks as indisputable proof of that support.
And finally – call your Senators and Representatives!