Hosting events for candidates

[geniph]

Hi all - glad to see this group up and running.

Here's some suggestions for folks who might not know what they can do to help at the precinct level. As some of you know, I ran for office last year as a long-shot candidate for King County Council (King County is the largest county in Washington state - Seattle's in King County). I lost, but I learned a great deal.

The things that were the most helpful to me as a candidate were the events that people hosted in their homes; coffee meetings, lunches, barbecues, evening "get-to-know-the-candidate" get-togethers - these kinds of casual meetings were by FAR the most useful campaign events for a campaign like mine, run on a shoestring by volunteers. At these smaller events, a candidate has a real chance to actually TALK to the people there, answer their questions, make a personal connection. Every one of these I attended, nearly every single person in the room made some kind of donation, and that's where most of my volunteers and "evangelizers" came from. I did far, FAR better at these small events than I did at the huge political dinners and such where there were 30 candidates and 250 people.

Even if your house is too small, maybe there's a neighborhood park nearby where you could put together a neighborhood picnic or block party. The block I live on does a yearly outdoor block party/picnic every summer, and the last few years, we've been inviting local political candidates to come meet and greet. If your neighbors - especially the non-political types! - get a chance to meet political candidates, it can make all the difference in a small campaign.

So talk to your local school board, city council, county council, state legislative candidates' campaign offices about hosting a small event for them. Nothing else comes close as far as really helping a campaign become "viral" - you have to have those new converts to spread the message that, hey, there's this great person running for this office, I met him/her, and I was really impressed.

[OhioBlue]

1. Thanks for the tips geniph! n/t

[NMDemDist2]

2. thanks! hope you stick around, sounds like your experience will be

extremely valuable to this group!

:yourock: