Earlier this month, Independent Sector rolled out our new Action Center—a tool to help you educate your policymakers about issues that matter to your work. We’ve already shared some ways to use this powerful tool, but maybe you’re wondering why it’s important to take advantage of the ways to engage your Members of Congress on critical issues—or if your outreach even makes a difference. We assure you that it does. Here are a few reasons why:
- You’re the expert Congress should be hearing from you about how they can help to maximize the impact of America’s nonprofits. If you’re not talking about how nonprofit policy can be improved, then who is? We spend our days in and out fighting for the communities we serve, but we can help to make the work of all nonprofits go further by sharing our opinions and changing policy at the national level. Many light touches only take a few minutes and they make a difference! While you’re waiting for the metro, in line for coffee, or taking a break from work, fire off a tweet, submit a comment, or send a letter with a personal touch about how policy proposals will affect your work.
- There are important issues impacting the whole sector up for debate. You can help change public policy that affects the entire sector as well. Independent Sector is hard at work on these issues every day, but there is always strength in numbers – and as a community, we need policymakers to hear from you too. How would you be affected if the Johnson Amendment was repealed? How would your organization benefit from an uptick in giving if all your donors could claim a charitable deduction?
- You don’t have to be a policy wonk to make a difference. Public policy affects everyone. Policy can seem dry or complicated – but it doesn’t have to be. We’ve already done the hard work for you. In our Action Center, you can read up on issues that affect the charitable sector and send customizable, pre-written directly to your lawmaker’s office.
Visit our new Action Center, and let your colleagues and allies in the sector know they can help too!
