CSBA’s legislative action strategy goes local
Mark your calendars for May 30 and June 1
Published: March 6, 2012
CSBA’s Legislative Action Conference, which normally follows the Delegate Assembly meeting in Sacramento each May, will instead unfold throughout the state this year, targeting legislators in their local district offices at crucial decision-making junctures.
The change in strategy will give school board members better access to their legislators and require less time than the Legislative Action Conference’s traditional trip to Sacramento, and it will reinforce legislators’ perception of participating governance team members as leaders in their local communities.
CSBA is moving to two separate and distinct grassroots advocacy events to maximize the impact of its members’ concerted lobbying efforts:
- The action begins the week of March 19, focusing on legislators who sit on the state Senate and Assembly budget subcommittees that hear K-12 budget issues. CSBA’s leaders in those districts—governmental relations chairs, Delegate Assembly members and regional directors— will meet with the selected legislators in their home districts, delivering a coordinated advocacy voice developed from shared CSBA briefing materials.
- On June 1—two weeks after Gov. Jerry Brown releases the annual May Revision to his 2012-13 budget proposal, and two weeks before the Legislature’s deadline to adopt a balanced budget—the lobbying activities that had concluded the Legislative Action Conference will give way to a local advocacy day. Like the March events, school board members will once again deliver CSBA’s message to legislators in their home district offices, where most legislators will be because June 1—a Friday—is typically not a day when legislative sessions are scheduled.
This effort will go beyond the March advocacy efforts, with volunteers sought from school boards in every state Senate and Assembly district. Registration will begin later this month and will be required in order to inform participants on issues, strategy and tactics so they can all help deliver a unified message to legislators. Topics will include a number of education policy areas in addition to budget-related issues.
Participants from each legislative district will meet in groups with their legislators in appointments arranged by CSBA. The goal with this first-of-its-kind event is to equal the number of participating school board members who have participated in the Legislative Action Conference in the past—at least 300. A live, Web-based briefing session is planned for the morning of May 30 so members can prepare in the comfort of their own homes or offices.
Just as important, a similar event—this time focused on federal education issues—is planned in the fall, when Congress is supposed to adopt the federal budget. As with the state advocacy efforts, CSBA will focus its attention on meetings in the district offices of members of Congress. The fall event will highlight CSBA’s federal budget priorities as well as key policy issues, such as reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. The timing will be announced in June, once the congressional calendar for September and October is known.
Local focus is both strategic and practical
“With the new focus on local meetings, more CSBA members will be able to participate and more legislators will hear about our priorities,” CSBA Executive Director Vernon M. Billy said.
Because of dwindling travel budgets and competing time commitments associated with the two-day Legislative Action Conference—and the former Federal Issues Conference, which was even more grueling and expensive—CSBA leaders sought a change that would be less costly and time-consuming for local board members and for CSBA, and even more effective in advancing the interests of public schools.
More information will be coming soon. Watch for details in California School News Weekly Updates and on the CSBA website. In the meantime, members are urged to mark their calendars for the morning of May 30 for the Web-based briefing and the day of June 1 for local lobbying efforts.