ACTION PLAYBOOK:

Contact Your Governor

  • Urge your governor’s office to take executive action on a climate solution.

    1. Send an email

    2. Call or leave a voicemail

    3. Tag them on social media

    4. Report back

    5. Multiply your impact

1. Send a personalized email to your governor

It might be tempting to sign your name to the bottom of a completely prewritten email, but personalized emails are much more attention-grabbing. They also get processed individually, whereas identical letters are batched. Our Slack #wins-shoutouts channel is packed with celebratory posts from changemakers who sent personalized emails to elected officials and received awesome personal responses. It’s always worth it!

Use the tool below to personalize and send an email to your governor about the featured policy priority. In the template, make sure to customize the sections in brackets! You should also save a copy of your email text to use as a phone script.

This letter is customized to your governor depending on their political ideology and the status of the featured policy in your state.

Above, you’ll see the Climate Changemakers current featured advocacy campaign.
Want to work on a different policy solution? You can find email templates for all active campaigns here.

2. Make a call

Next, call your governor’s office using the email from Step 1 as a loose script.

To find a number for your governor’s office:

  1. Click here and enter your home address

  2. Choose “State Officials”

  3. Expand the results to locate your governor.

Once you have the number, you’re ready to call! You’ll want to start by identifying your status as a resident of the state, then make sure to be concise and specific. Be polite, but don’t be afraid to get personal. There’s no shame in practicing before you call.

If they don’t pick up, don’t worry—your voicemail will be documented. And if you prefer to leave a voicemail rather than talk to a real person, call after hours.

3. Tag your governor on social media

Public amplification can grab the attention of policymakers and elicit a response. Turn your personalized message into a social post, being sure to preserve the specific ask. Remember to tag their handles!

Need ideas for your post? Check the blog post or Issue Briefing for this week’s Action Plan.

4. Report back

If you receive a response from your governor’s office, please share it with advocacy@climatechangemakers.org or send a message to a staff member in the Climate Changemakers Slack. You can simply forward email responses or send a screenshot. This enables us to more accurately track our community’s collective impact.

👎 Did your governor give a reason it can’t happen in your state? Okay, anything you learn from their response is valuable—including their real or perceived barriers to action—so please report back. We’re trying to grease the wheels for deploying climate solutions, so the more we know, the more effective we can become as connectors and advocates.

👍 Did you get an enthusiastic response? Awesome! Consider sharing it publicly in the Climate Changemakers 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.

5. Multiply your impact

Now that you’ve taken action, increase your impact by talking about it!

“The most important thing you can do to fight climate change is to talk about it.”
– Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, climate scientist and communicator

Network effects are powerful. Connecting others with opportunities to take productive climate action is a crucial step toward changing cultural norms and making real progress. We're not the only ones asking, “What more can I do?”. Answering that question for others is an important climate action.

📲 Easy option: simply share this LinkedIn post.

⚡ Level up! Get creative with how you spread the word and invite others into action! This could look like… a post on Reddit or the social media network of your choice, sharing links in a Slack community, a group text, or an email listserv. Frame it however you think might be the most effective.

Looking for tips and tools for more effective climate convos? We got you.

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

© 2023 Climate Changemakers