Looking for ways to establish positive, long-term relationships with your legislators on behalf of your library and the communities you serve? Join us for this online workshop exploring that essential element of advocacy and how you can effectively put it to work through the annual Day in the District meetings designed to foster positive, productive conversations between library advocates and the elected officials as we discuss the shared interests we have.

Topics include how to become involved in Day in the District; how to identify and contact your elected officials; practices followed by advocates who successfully establish long-term, productive relationships with elected officials; and resources available to us as we continue building those relationships.

Goal:

By participating in this session, you will learn, from peers, how you can foster positive, productive relationships with your elected officials and begin identifying how to effectively take part in Day in the District activities this year.

During the session, you will:

• Identify at least three ways of gaining your legislators’ attention
• Learn how to incorporate, into your own advocacy work, at least three practices followed by peers who work effectively with legislators to meet community needs through libraries
• Develop a brief plan of action to participate in Day in the District 2024

N.B.: Those interested in the previous version of this workshop, offered in March 2023, can view the archived recording on the CLA YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCOUD1OUNTA&list=PLdrlIGxgBLmXyjrj1cHsWCcSm5vlPiXa8&index=16.

Session Facilitators:  

Crystal Miles, Public Services Manager at Sacramento Public Library; member of the CLA Advocacy & Legislation Committee, and former member of the Ursula Meyer Advocacy Training Committee

Ray Pun, Academic and Research Librarian at the Alder Graduate School of Education; member of the CLA Advocacy & Legislation Committee

Amreet Sandhu, Training & Outreach Librarian for the Sacramento County Public Law Library; member of the Ursula Meyer Advocacy Training Committee and the CLA Advocacy & Legislation Committee

Gary Shaffer, Director, Palm Desert Library; Immediate Past President, California Library Association

Paul Signorelli (panel moderator), CLA Library Advocacy Training Project Manager and author of Change the World Using Social Media (Rowman & Littlefield, 2021)

About the Ursula Meyer Advocacy Fund Training Series

This program is part of an ongoing series of monthly online sessions organized offered through the Ursula Meyer Advocacy Fund Training Series; sessions are generally held online on the second Wednesday of each month, beginning at 10 am PT. The series honors the memory of Ursula Meyer, 1977-78 CLA President, California Library Hall of Fame inductee, longtime director of the Stockton-San Joaquin Public Library, and fierce advocate for library services and intellectual freedom. The Ursula Meyer Fund was established to provide for the training of librarians in all stages of their careers, and library supporters, in political advocacy and political action, in honor of Ursula’s belief that librarians need effective political skills to advocate for library support at all levels of government. Archived recordings of previous sessions are available on the California Library Association YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/@californialibraryassociati2705/videos.

To support the series though a donation, please visit the CLA website at https://www.cla-net.org/donations/fund.asp?id=23440.