ACTION PLAYBOOK:
Contact Your County Officials
Effectively encourage your county officials to take action and execute a regional climate vision.
Step 1: Gather contact information for your county officials
There is no central database of everyone’s county representatives, because America has over 3,100 counties, and each one structures their local government differently.
Start with the usa.gov database. Enter your address, click “Local Officials,” and within that section, click “County Officials.” Look for titles like County Commissioner, County Executive, County Mayor, County Supervisor, or County Administrator. These positions may vary by county and are usually directly elected.
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…head to Google. Search: [name of your county] + county commissioner.
⚠️ Counties are weird! If you’re still having trouble finding your county officials, it might not be your fault. Sometimes, cities are governed independently of counties (like in Virginia or Washington, DC), or the county exists but completely overlaps with the city (as in New York City, where you should instead contact your borough president). And sometimes, the county has no government at all, as in CT, RI, western MA, and around Norfolk, VA. Try one last Google: [name of your county] + alternative to county government. If nothing turns up, choose a county immediately outside your city, where you formerly lived, or where you have close ties.
Find your reps? Write down the contact information. Once you have the name of your county officials, use the usa.gov results from above or the county’s official website to find each office’s:
Email address (preferred) or online contact form
Phone number
Social media handle (preferably where they’re most active, otherwise your preferred channel)
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Create a new contact for each of your county officials. Include their office phone number, email address, website, and social media. This will make it so much simpler to contact them in the future.
While you’re at it, follow them on social media, and look for a “Subscribe to my Newsletter” option on the official website. Receiving their content in your feed & inbox on a regular basis will make you an infinitely more effective advocate. You’ll get a sense of their priorities, get the chance to meet them at community events, and learn about new issues to contact them about.
Step 2: Get to know their priorities, values, and record on climate action
To be the most effective advocate possible, you need to build an authentic relationship with your elected officials. And no, this is not just for fancy donors or political operatives. County officials are shockingly accessible, and they genuinely want to get to know their constituents.
Relationship-building starts by learning more about them. When you know what issues they care about and their history of climate action, you can tailor your outreach to resonate with them personally.
Follow this worksheet to research your county officials:
Pro tip: Save the file to your computer so you can add to it over time. Build it out with research on other elected officials, and update it as you learn new information.
Step 3: Send a personalized email
It might be tempting to sign your name to the bottom of a prewritten email, but personalized emails are much more attention-grabbing. They also get processed individually, whereas mass-produced letters are batched. It’s always worth it!
Copy/paste the template below into your email client.
Tips & reminders:
Customize the sections in brackets and carry over any links.
Email each elected official separately, though feel free to use the same email copy for both.
Please bcc advocacy@climatechangemakers.org so we can track our impact.
Save a copy of your email to use as a phone script in the next step.
Step 4: Make a call
Next up: Call the number(s) you found in Step 1, using your email from the previous step as a script.
If you’re nervous, just remember that our reps and their staff are fellow humans from the same community as you. They’re also professionals being paid to listen to you!. Your job here is to convey your authentic concern about an issue – you do not need to be an expert.
If they don’t pick up, don’t worry—your voicemail will be documented the same as a real-time call. (And if you prefer to leave a voicemail rather than talk to a real person, call after hours!)
Step 5: Tag your county officials on social media
Onward! Making your ask publicly has the power to grab the attention of policymakers and elicit a response. Elected officials are sensitive to public perception, so they take note of what their constituents say in public. Also, some policymakers run their own social media accounts, so you may even reach some of them directly with your post. You can even try sliding into their DMs!
Use the template below to start a post, customizing everywhere you can, while being sure to preserve the specific ask and tag their handles.
Step 6: Now that you’ve taken action, invite your friends to do the same (don’t skip this!)
You (and only you!) have the power to influence certain people around you to take action. To make the greatest impact possible, we have to get comfortable talking about climate action with friends – even if they say, “No thanks, not today.” It’s how we 2x, 5x, or even 10x our impact on the issues we care most about. More people taking action = more public pressure for climate solutions.
📲 For an easy option, start with a social media post. Start from scratch, or repost from Climate Changemakers (@theclimatevote) with your own commentary on Instagram, BlueSky, or LinkedIn. You can do this in writing, or better yet, in a quick selfie video. The algorithms love video.
Whether you’re drafting from scratch or reposting with commentary, here’s an effective message arc:
🤓 What did you learn: I just learned that [insert most interesting factoid].
❤️🔥 Why do you care: This is really [emotional adjective like ‘exciting’ or ‘worrying’] because [why do you feel that way].
✅ What did you do: I just contacted my county commissioner here in [county], which was honestly way less intimidating and way more empowering than I thought it would be.
❓ Invitation/Call to Action: If any of my people in [places where this is relevant] want to do this with me, here’s a step-by-step playbook: https://www.climatechangemakers.org/preview-contact-your-county
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Take this step to the next level by considering which other county officials in your area need a nudge, and then reach out to a friend who lives in their district.
To make it as easy as possible for your friend, you can even “ghostwrite” for them. Just do this playbook again as if you were your friend and deliver them a ready-to-send email, phone number to call, and social media post to amplify. The more people get involved, the stronger the public pressure. The more targeted the public pressure, the more likely we are to succeed.
It’s also strategic to choose someone who lives in another county where the issue is hot. Picture a scenario where you live in Berkeley, CA, and the neighboring city of San Francisco hasn't yet banned fossil gas in new buildings. You also just read that in Salem, Oregon, a city council vote on this issue is imminent. In this case, your San Francisco friends can wait—text that Salem bestie immediately!
Step 7: Report back
If you haven’t heard back in a week, follow up! A friendly nudge, just checking in that they received your email and the resources, is totally appropriate and often appreciated.
If you receive a response from your local officials:
Please report back to advocacy@climatechangemakers.org. You can simply forward email responses or send a screenshot. This enables us to more accurately track our collective impact.
Did they seem skeptical? It's really useful to learn of any barriers for your county. We’re trying to grease the wheels to deploying climate solutions, so the more we know, the more effective we can become as connectors and advocates.
Were they enthusiastic? Awesome! In addition to forwarding to Climate Changemakers staff, consider sharing your response publicly in our epic Slack #wins-shoutouts channel —other changemakers may find it motivating and inspiring. We’re normalizing civic action on climate, and it starts with talking about it.
And that’s it, playbook complete! Feel accomplished.
Thank you for taking action.
🎉 CUE CONFETTI by clicking COMPLETE! 🎉
Want more action?
Go to the current Action Plan
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