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Advocacy Blog
Tuesday, October 02, 2007
Communicating With Congress and the E-Mail Surplus
In July we reported that the Congressional Management Foundation (CMF) is working on a project to attempt to solve a problem facing Members and their staff, excessive amounts of e-mail that often causes their systems to crash. Congressional staffers are frustrated with the amount of email while advocates are upset and worried that the correspondence they send to Members might not be getting any attention. Participants in online action campaigns often rely on organizations to research the issues, track legislation, and write correspondence, making participating quick and easy.
CMF hosted a forum bringing together advocacy groups and congressional offices. The forum will result in a report with recommendations for Congressional offices and advice to advocacy groups and vendors trying to get messages to Congress.
Roll Call ($$) reports that Americans expect to be able to communicate with Members of Congress, and most constituents are using the Internet to send these communications. "CMF released results of a survey conducted two weeks ago that found 79 percent of Americans have contacted a Senator or Representative during the past five years."
Technical barriers such as logic puzzles, misperceptions that vendors send out spam, confusing user experiences and a lack of universal standards (keep in mind Members' offices basically are 540 small businesses) contribute to the problem, according to Mike Panetta, assistant vice president of public affairs and emerging media for the consultant group Grassroots Enterprise. "It's an arms race," said Panetta, also D.C.'s shadow representative. "And at the end of the day, an arms race really hurts the people."
Posted by Amanda Adams
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