Lobbying Training

This page is meant to be a tutorial on basic Lobby skills. It is based on the information presented by Alice Bartelt, Carol Greenough, and Jennifer Warren at our 2005/01 central committee meeting. Please go through it and send any comments or suggestions to webmaster@washcodems.org.

Write/Phone your Representative

The most fundamental action is simply to contact your representative (or an aide) in support or opposition on a specific issue or bill. This can be written, through regular mail or email, or verbally over the phone.

One way of doing this is to respond to action alerts. The advantage is that you are adding your voice to many others and you are contacting them at a legislatively important time. This tends to have the greatest impact. The WashCoDem websites has a section for Action Alerts and info on how to contact your representative. Please review these pages periodically and contact your representative, its an easy way to stay involved and add your voice.

WashCo Dem Issue Pages

Its just as important to write to Republicans as to Democrats, the alert will usually specify who to contact and provide some background you can include in your letter. Put the letter in your own words, concerning 1 topic, and keep in under 1 page (2-3 paragraphs).

The following links provide additional tips (from various groups) about letter writting and contacting your representative.

Writing a Letter to the editor is also an important way to get the word out. Our Issues page contains a list of area newspapers and how to contact them. The links below contain letetr writing tips.

Writting a Letter to the Editor

How a Bill Becomes Law

This is the general process followed in Congress and Salem. Action alerts can be sent at any of these stages to help move or kill a specific bill. Our action alert blog will help notify you when to contact your representatives based on where a bill is in this process.

Introduction: Bill drafted and introduced by a member of the legislature. Other Legislator's can sign on as cosponsors. A large number of cosponsor's is often important in moving a bill.
Committee Review: The bill sent to and reviewed by a legislative committee, it must pass here before it can get a floor vote, most bills die in committee.
Committee's often hold hearings to gather public and expert opinions on their bills, testifying before a committee (or getting your representative to do so) gives a bill momentum.
Know the committees your representative serves on because it is here where they have their greatest impact.
Floor vote Bill must be approved on the House and Senate Floor.
Conference Committee The House and Senate versions of a bill usually differ, the conference committee merges these bills into a unified bill.
Final Floor vote Both legislative chambers must approve the unified bill before its sent to the governor, or preseident (Chief Executive).
Chief Executive Approval The bill becomes law if the Chief executive approves it. If they veto it the legislature can override the veto with a super majority (2/3 vote). In Salem, the legislature or governor can by-pass each other and send a measure directly to voters as a referendum.

Oregon State Legislature

Our state legislature maintains a useful website, check the links below to explore it.

Lobbying US Congress

Review these links to monitor your representatives or track specific issues.

Lobbying Training