My Life. My neighborhood. Our world.

The African American Museum of Iowa will reopen its doors on January 17, 2009 with the premiere of its long-awaited exhibit “No Roads Lead to Buxton,” and an all-day open house to see how the Museum has changed since the 2008 floods. 
 

 Green Communities is the first national green building program focused entirely on affordable housing. Launched by Enterprise in fall 2004, Green Communities is designed to help developers, investors, builders and policymakers make the transition to a greener future for affordable housing.

A comprehensive offering of Green Grants, loans, tax-credit equity, training and technical assistance gives developers and builders the resources to bring green projects to life....

In Phase One of our Grassroots Organizing process you did your homework on The Big Picture of your issue area and selected a specific agenda on which to work. Understanding the Big Picture of your issue is crucial to grassroots organizing but so is doing your homework on the People related to your issue area. In Phase Two you identify The People Networks related to the agenda you just selected and dig in deeply to assess your network resources and support.

Now that you have done your homework and researched The Big Picture surrounding your issue, it is time to Map the Issue Space. Mapping the issue space helps you to find a course of action - your agenda - with goals you can measure and success you can track. This is a real brainstorming event, and it gets to be a lot of fun.

Tunnel vision is a real hazard of grassroots organizing. When you are passionate about an issue or focused on a specific agenda, your view of every thing else around it can get mighty cloudy. You might hear what you want to hear, see what you want to see and put on blinders to any competing information. The problem is that YOU may not see/hear alternative viewpoints, but others in your community will not be so blind or deaf. And, your credibility can be gained or lost forever if you are not well prepared with real information.

Activists will be most successful if they work on an issue that passionately excites them because there will always be frustration and unexpected setbacks. If individuals do not care passionately about what they are involved in, it will be much too easy to give up and walk away.

In Phase One of the Influence without Authority (IWA) grassroots organizing process, you go through 4 steps to help you choose and define an issue on which to work. Choosing the right issue on which to work is often the most difficult part of the IWA Win-Win Process. It is also the most critical. Focusing on the wrong issue, or on the right issue at the wrong time, can waste precious energy and resources. Worse, it can discourage volunteers, or undermine the credibility and reputation of an advocate or an advocacy group.

There is both art and skill in being a successful grassroots organizer. The right mix of passion and delivery, a keen understanding of the Big Picture, and a clear identification of all the stakeholders are key ingredients for success. Gaining support from diverse individuals and groups who do not share common ground is a challenging and complex social process. And, trying to move a stalwart opponent to become a supporter can be highly contentious and terribly frustrating.