INSTRUCTIONS FOR MEETING WITH ELECTED OFFICIALS
Part of the effort to end discrimination in women’s health involves contacting your local elected officials to request an in-person meeting during the official Endometriosis Advocacy Week.
Legislators do meet with constituents on occasion, or, at the very least, arrange for one of their staff members to do so. A meeting with a staff member is just as meaningful as one with an elected official because staffers report directly to their officials and help them with key policy decisions. Therefore, don’t miss out on an opportunity to make your case as a constituent.
The process for requesting an in-person meeting with your elected official and/or a staff member is actually relatively straightforward. However, you’ll need to be persistent because it may take several phone calls and/or emails to receive a reply and another series of correspondences to actually schedule the appointment during Advocacy Week.
Below is a step-by-step guideline for making an appointment for an in-person visit. And, to help your email or call stand out from others, we’ve also included sample outreach letters and tips on what you can do to make your representatives aware of why endometriosis is such a critically important issue deserving of their attention. Since you are representing the endometriosis community, as well as the EndoMarch organization, please do remain professional and friendly throughout the entire process, even if at first it may feel that your calls/emails are being ignored; someone will eventually get in touch with you, so patience combined with friendly persistence are of critical importance during the process.
STEP 1
The very first step is to check with the Chair of the Advocacy Week Committee to determine if appointments with elected officials in your district have already been scheduled. In this way, we can avoid duplicating efforts and making multiple appointments with the same elected official. If a meeting is already scheduled, the Chair will provide you with the meeting time, place, and date of any currently scheduled appointments. Another important reason to check in with the Chair and/or other Advocacy Week Committee Members is that they will have available downloadable materials with important instructions and tips for meeting with elected officials.
STEP 2
If no other meetings have been scheduled, then the next step is to find your district’s congress members and your state’s U.S. Senators. This is crucial because local officials are of course more likely to listen to your concerns if you live in the area that they represent (in other words, if you are one of their constituents). To find your district’s elected officials, simply follow the instructions you’ll find on the websites listed below.
To find your local Congressman or woman, please visit here
To find your U.S. Senators (federal, not state), please visit this page
The following phone numbers and websites should also be very helpful:
- To get connected directly to the Congressman or woman you request, you can call the U.S. House of Representatives switchboard at (202) 226-4101.
- To get connected directly to the Senate office you request, you can call the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121.
STEP 3)
Call the state and district office listed for your representative and ask to schedule a meeting to discuss endometriosis, a serious health issue;” or as we like to say, a national health crisis. You’ll also want to follow up with an email that could include flyers about endometriosis. The committee will provide a link to downloadable printed materials for you to use.
DC-BOUND DELEGATES: You’ll want to check with the Chair for specifics, but you would normally want to mention that you’d be attending this meeting as a group of other endometriosis sufferers and supporters, in collaboration with the Worldwide EndoMarch nonprofit and that you’d like to, if at all possible, schedule the meeting(s) to coincide with the EndoMarch events taking place in Washington, D.C. during the last week in March. For the D.C. delegation for 2016, the two days that we’ll focus on specifically are Thursday, March 24th, and Friday, March 25th, 2016.
STATE CAPITAL-BOUND DELEGATES: For those planning on traveling to your state capital, you can mention the same facts as above, but with either your state capital or the elected official’s district office as the meeting place.
STEP 4
As mentioned, several attempts are usually necessary before anyone from the legislator’s office responds to you. Because of this, you’ll want to work closely with the committee, to provide updates and recruit more help from the team if necessary. When a confirmation for a meeting date is provided, share this information with the committee so that other group members can be recruited to attend the meeting with you, if possible. Since the steps and methods for coordinating a group organizing are complex, the additional steps to take from here will be provided by the committee in a separate format.
OTHER TIPS
Tips When Contacting Officials:
1. Review any materials provided by the Advocacy Week Committee
2. Be sure to review the Do’s and Don’ts of Contacting Elected Officials
3. Be sure to include your reason for contacting the official
4. Be sure to invite your local official to the Washington, DC-based Worldwide EndoMarch, taking place on Saturday, March 26, 2016 (precise location TBA)
5. Feel free to include the EndoMarch website of www.endomarch.org, as well as those of other nonprofit endometriosis organizations, including:
www.endocenter.org
www.endofound.org
http://www.endometriosisassn.org/
Part of the effort to end discrimination in women’s health involves contacting your local elected officials to request an in-person meeting during the official Endometriosis Advocacy Week.
Legislators do meet with constituents on occasion, or, at the very least, arrange for one of their staff members to do so. A meeting with a staff member is just as meaningful as one with an elected official because staffers report directly to their officials and help them with key policy decisions. Therefore, don’t miss out on an opportunity to make your case as a constituent.
The process for requesting an in-person meeting with your elected official and/or a staff member is actually relatively straightforward. However, you’ll need to be persistent because it may take several phone calls and/or emails to receive a reply and another series of correspondences to actually schedule the appointment during Advocacy Week.
Below is a step-by-step guideline for making an appointment for an in-person visit. And, to help your email or call stand out from others, we’ve also included sample outreach letters and tips on what you can do to make your representatives aware of why endometriosis is such a critically important issue deserving of their attention. Since you are representing the endometriosis community, as well as the EndoMarch organization, please do remain professional and friendly throughout the entire process, even if at first it may feel that your calls/emails are being ignored; someone will eventually get in touch with you, so patience combined with friendly persistence are of critical importance during the process.
STEP 1
The very first step is to check with the Chair of the Advocacy Week Committee to determine if appointments with elected officials in your district have already been scheduled. In this way, we can avoid duplicating efforts and making multiple appointments with the same elected official. If a meeting is already scheduled, the Chair will provide you with the meeting time, place, and date of any currently scheduled appointments. Another important reason to check in with the Chair and/or other Advocacy Week Committee Members is that they will have available downloadable materials with important instructions and tips for meeting with elected officials.
STEP 2
If no other meetings have been scheduled, then the next step is to find your district’s congress members and your state’s U.S. Senators. This is crucial because local officials are of course more likely to listen to your concerns if you live in the area that they represent (in other words, if you are one of their constituents). To find your district’s elected officials, simply follow the instructions you’ll find on the websites listed below.
To find your local Congressman or woman, please visit here
To find your U.S. Senators (federal, not state), please visit this page
The following phone numbers and websites should also be very helpful:
- To get connected directly to the Congressman or woman you request, you can call the U.S. House of Representatives switchboard at (202) 226-4101.
- To get connected directly to the Senate office you request, you can call the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121.
STEP 3)
Call the state and district office listed for your representative and ask to schedule a meeting to discuss endometriosis, a serious health issue;” or as we like to say, a national health crisis. You’ll also want to follow up with an email that could include flyers about endometriosis. The committee will provide a link to downloadable printed materials for you to use.
DC-BOUND DELEGATES: You’ll want to check with the Chair for specifics, but you would normally want to mention that you’d be attending this meeting as a group of other endometriosis sufferers and supporters, in collaboration with the Worldwide EndoMarch nonprofit and that you’d like to, if at all possible, schedule the meeting(s) to coincide with the EndoMarch events taking place in Washington, D.C. during the last week in March. For the D.C. delegation for 2016, the two days that we’ll focus on specifically are Thursday, March 24th, and Friday, March 25th, 2016.
STATE CAPITAL-BOUND DELEGATES: For those planning on traveling to your state capital, you can mention the same facts as above, but with either your state capital or the elected official’s district office as the meeting place.
STEP 4
As mentioned, several attempts are usually necessary before anyone from the legislator’s office responds to you. Because of this, you’ll want to work closely with the committee, to provide updates and recruit more help from the team if necessary. When a confirmation for a meeting date is provided, share this information with the committee so that other group members can be recruited to attend the meeting with you, if possible. Since the steps and methods for coordinating a group organizing are complex, the additional steps to take from here will be provided by the committee in a separate format.
OTHER TIPS
Tips When Contacting Officials:
1. Review any materials provided by the Advocacy Week Committee
2. Be sure to review the Do’s and Don’ts of Contacting Elected Officials
3. Be sure to include your reason for contacting the official
4. Be sure to invite your local official to the Washington, DC-based Worldwide EndoMarch, taking place on Saturday, March 26, 2016 (precise location TBA)
5. Feel free to include the EndoMarch website of www.endomarch.org, as well as those of other nonprofit endometriosis organizations, including:
www.endocenter.org
www.endofound.org
http://www.endometriosisassn.org/