During the smoking debate it was “Ban the Ban” and “Save Madison Jobs” – and various members of the council were Nazi’s and a long list of other things I probably shouldn’t repeat.
Now, during sick leave it’s “Stop the Mandates!” And we’re still Nazi’s and a long list of other things I probably shouldn’t repeat.
While these gimmicky slogans are cute and all, communicating with elected officials and committee members through slogans is completely ineffective. And if it isn’t obvious, calling us names is doubly ineffective.
Now I’m not naive enough to think that these folks actually want to affect change. In fact, I believe the not so clever slogans and radio ads that they paid PR firms to produce are nothing more than an appeal to get people riled up and generate new members for their various organizations.
However, there may be a few people out there who actually want to affect policy, instead of just claiming they want to affect policy. Here’s a few tips if you want to be effective:
a. Know what the ordinance actually says.
b. Don’t trust your lobbying group to give you accurate information, you’ll be sadly disappointed.
c. Offer concrete examples of how the ordinance effects you.
d. Offer suggestions on how the ordinance could be changed.
During the 4 hour long paid sick leave hearing in front of the Economic Development Commission one advocate took detailed notes. The advocate had the highlighter ready to highlight all suggestions that came from the business community to see if such suggestions would be viable changes to the ordinance. After 4 hours, the highlighter was used exactly 0 times, yup, not once. Not one single suggestion on how to improve or change the ordinance . . . but how many people do you think repeated the slogan “Stop the Mandates!” Not a very effective use of their time!
