Lately I’ve been pondering a couple of things.
Like, Austin Independent School District has to lay off 1,500 teachers.
And corporations like Amazon, BP, and other gas companies post record profits.
To Quote Michael Moore, “America is not broke.”
I think just getting sponsorships from these companies is not enough. I mean, they are just going to make even more money. And we are grubbing at their feet for pennies, when we need to take a page from their book and start advocacy programs.
The zombie corporations are holding the money hostage. We need to free that money through legislative action. Protests are nice and all, but what is really going to get politicians to pay attention to you is the communities that you can encourage to vote one way or another based on the politicians stance on certain issues, like money for schools versus no taxes for corporations.
Jocelyn Harmon does a nice job of talking about how we can start to advocate over on her blog.
You need to advocate for a greater proportion of city/county/state money to be given to your nonprofit. It’s easy for me to say this, in a capitol city in Texas, but even if you don’t live in or near a capitol of your state, you can start to set this process in motion. How?
- Ask electeds to your events.
- Go get on their conference calls.
- Bond together with sister nonprofits and form a coalition to get some traction in the legislature.
- Organize a letter-writing campaign or some e-petitions about issues that are important to you.
- Figure out which coalitions in your state are key in getting the money allocated to which nonprofits.
- Which coalitions or parties are instrumental in helping corporations not pay any taxes in your state?
You need to show them that you are LISTENING and WATCHING and that you know that states are broke because states are not charging equitable taxes to big corporations.
Remember. “Charity is no substitute for justice withheld.” -Saint Augustine
PS!
Would you like to know where to get grants for women?
Here’s a comprehensive list of grants for women and girls.
And here’s another.
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