AAUW California Public Policy and Advocacy Committee Description and Member Responsibilities

publicpolicy@aauw-ca.org

Purpose: Determines, with member input, AAUW California’s biennial policy priorities and yearly legislative agenda. Formulates and administers a legislative advocacy program for branch members. Organizes Lobby Day for members to advocate with local legislators.  Conducts educational seminars and relevant social media campaigns, provides action-based resources, and assists branches in developing robust public policy programs.

 General Member Duties: All committee members will be asked to:

• Serve on the Legislative Subcommittee. Help develop a comprehensive legislative action agenda for each annual legislative cycle. Duties include reviewing proposed bills and assisting in selecting final bills for advocacy. All members are required to attend all mandatory working hours of a two-day meeting in March (see below). Subcommittee is most active January-April. 
• Serve on at least one additional subcommittee. Subcommittee descriptions below. Committee members’ duties will vary depending on the subcommittees on which they serve. 
• Submit subcommittee updates to committee chair(s) by filing meeting agendas and notes on a monthly or bi-monthly basis, depending on subcommittee meeting schedule (subcommittee chairs only). 
• Write one article per year for branch newsletters.
• Serve in leadership role(s) on Lobby Day each April (in-person or remote).

Subcommittee descriptions:

• Lobby Day. Work with chair(s) and legislative advocate to recruit members and match with legislators. Develop a training webinar and materials to educate members on top bills. Collect feedback from teams and write a follow-up newsletter article. Subcommittee is most active January-April. 
• Public Policy Communications. Develop social media campaigns to provide both education and targeted pathways for action. Keep the Public Policy website updated with fresh content. Assist, as needed, with Public Policy Newsletter content and design. Subcommittee is active year-round.
• Public Policy Priorities. Work with chair(s) to update public policy priorities, which guide the creation of annual legislative agendas. Design outreach survey for members to review public policy priorities. Review input from branch members on public policy priorities and assist char(s) in developing a draft of priority changes/updates.
• Special Project-City Council Action and Monitoring Project (CCAMP). Work with chair(s) to maintain and expand CCAMP, providing resources and support for members to attend local city council (and county supervisor) meetings. Goal of meetings is to build relationships, locally, to advance public policy priorities and prevent discrimination. The specific goals of the sub-committee may vary depending on the trajectory of the project per year.
• Special Project-School Board Project (SBP). Work with chair(s) to provide resources and support for members to monitor CA school boards. Goal is to assess the extent of issues of discrimination, book banning, and censorship in CA curricula and to ensure compliance with CA laws. The specific goals of the sub-committee may vary depending on the trajectory of the project per year.
• Voter Education and Get Out the Vote (GOTV). Develop educational campaigns to assist branches with efforts to increase voter awareness of AAUW-related issues. Assist with planning, coordination and delivery of training events and social media campaigns. Subcommittee is most active in election years, August-November.

Time commitment:  Time commitments vary depending on the subcommittee and the time of year, with some committees or projects occasionally requiring 5+ hours per week; however, committee members are notified of any potential increases in time commitment well in advance. In general, the bullets below outline the most common time commitments and requirements:

• A day-long “Committee Day” introductory meeting in August (eight to ten hours in one day, plus travel-time when held in-person; meeting potentially in-person, depending on budget)
• Eight to ten hours  per month for general committee work and bimonthly peer group meetings with an additional three to seven hours per month specifically in January – April
• One to three hours per month for subcommittee meetings and/or project-work, depending on leadership roles and/or subcommittee membership 
• A mandatory two-day Legislative Agenda meeting in March (eight to ten hours per day, plus travel-time when held in-person; meeting potentially in-person in Sacramento, depending on budgeting)
• A two-hour Lobby Days training webinar in late March or April, and two-day Lobby Days event in April (members are on-call for picking up meetings on each day of event; event potentially in-person in Sacramento, depending on budgeting)