Thursday, August 26, 2010

Excerpt from an email to Sharon Teal:

I can't believe it has only been a couple of weeks since I left Nashville.

First, I was in Boston for a week and a half training. We had a lot of briefings, role plays, and actions through the week. For example, someone would do a presentation on how to pitch stories to reporters so they'd come to an event, say a press conference. Then we'd break into small groups and practice calling each other so we'd solidify the idea. Other times they'd teach us something, like calling members to ask them to phone a senator to do so-and-so, and then we'd actual call members with a goal they'd set for us. We had an hour and a half and we had to call as many people as we could with the goal of getting 12 people to agree to call their senator and 4 volunteers to commit to helping at future events. Pretty simple.

Another thing we did was "canvassing." They taught us how, gave us a "rap" or speech basically, and then they pretty much just dropped me at the corner of a neighborhood with a map. My goal was to raise $150 to protect the Quabbin Resevoir in Massachusetts. I earned $680! The highest of all the group and they applauded me, which made me feel better about my blisters and dehydration.

Another thing we did was take metro into the city and collected signatures. The only neat thing about it was I got a cute boy to sign my petition and it turned into a coffee date, which turned into a dinner date, which turned into another dinner date, which really lead no where, but it was fun. :)

The last day of training they told me I was coming to California. I'm on an extended special mission. They even call it SWAT (Special Weekend Action Team, or something like that). SWATs usually only last a weekend, and they were created for those key moments before a particularly important vote when they need more people on the ground ringing doorbells, calling people or just straight-up lobbying politicians. So that's why I'm here, but it's extra SWAT-like because it's for 72 days. 69 now.

On November 2nd there will be a vote on many things, but I'm particularly concerned with Proposition 23. It's a ballot measure backed mainly by two Texas-based oil companies, Valero and Tesoro, that has been packaged as a jobs initiative. It would essentially roll-back California's premiere clean energy legislation until unemployment falls to or below 5.5% for 4 consecutive quarters (which hardly ever ever happens). It would stunt everything! And for what? Oil. Nice. So my job, after this stint in Sacramento (which is kind of like a staging area), will be to move onto some college campus (TBA) and rile them all up to vote NO on Prop 23.

This week though, about 8 of us have made about 300 cookies that have "23" with an anti- sign on it to pass out to legislators tomorrow. We made everything from scratch and used one conventional oven. It was insane. I've never been in a kitchen so hot. I have some funny pictures and a blister on my finger from stirring dough. We even made gobs of icing and decorated them ourselves. It's just one crazy thing to do to get visibility.


The other campaign the office is working on is to ban plastic bags in California. It's such a tight race I think I would literally get fired if I walked in the office with a plastic bag, for my boss's fear of the opposition (American Chemistry Council) gaining any leverage.

Everything is a whirlwind. I'm tired and hungry a lot and I have a cold, but I'm having an exciting new adventure! It'll all settle down when I'm in my own place. I'm staying with a co-worker and have been since Sunday. Things just aren't the same when you can't have you stuff in place, you know? That was awfully vague, but I'm living out of a suitcase on a pull-out couch. I think I'd just like to be able to leave my toiletries in the bathroom. I'm sure they wouldn't say anything if I did, but as a guest, I must consolidate and hope to be as invisible as possible (aside from my actual person), but you know what I mean. There's one bathroom for two adults, two guests, and one very adorable two year old, Oliver.

Well, I should be off to bed. We have a protest in the morning, followed by the grand cookie drop-off, and more prep for another visibility event on Friday.



1 comment:

kaibab said...

SWAT: Special Weekend Action Team!

Adorable.