OMB Watch
NPAction.org Partnership Planning
February 2009

Our democracy is at its best when policies, public priorities, and laws are fully debated in an open marketplace of ideas. OMB Watch believes nonprofit organizations play an essential role as a vehicle for civic participation in the United States. Nonpartisan civic engagement in public policy and other actions that affect our causes and communities is as essential as direct service – and essential to more effectively meet charitable missions. Yet research tells us not enough nonprofit organizations are addressing their causes in this manner.

To help build the capacity of nonprofit organizations to advocate, OMB Watch launched NPAction.org in 2005 with support from the Surdna Foundation and other funders. This online advocacy resource center provides nonprofits with valuable tools and information for issue advocacy and nonpartisan voter engagement. By 2008, with limited marketing, NPAction.org had an average of 7,000 visits per month. Though this number is not insignificant, we believe the site has potential to increase its usage though better presenting the wealth of information available, adding additional information, increasing outreach to bring people to the site, and above all, continuing to educate and motivate nonprofits to get involved in advocacy.

For NPAction.org to reach its full potential we want to pursue a creative multifaceted approach that would provide a host of skills-based public policy and civic engagement information, that would allow for collaboration on issues, and that would provide a networked community of civilly engaged nonprofit advocates. To achieve this, we want to explore the potential of a partnership with other organizations to ultimately develop a comprehensive advocacy through civic engagement campaign.

OMB Watch is undertaking a planning process to determine whether we can build a partnership with identified organizations, determine the elements it would take to reinvent and strengthen NPAction.org, design an outreach plan, and prepare a project proposal if there is a decision to move forward.

Plan of Action

The Center for Lobbying in the Public Interest (CLPI), the National Council of Nonprofits (NCN), the Nonprofit Voter Engagement Network (NVEN), and OMB Watch are exploring a partnership to address the goal of building nonprofit advocacy through a broad civic engagement campaign that incorporates revising the NPAction.org website and complementing it with an outreach initiative. This work will not be ideologically (or issue) driven, but rather focused on providing what is needed for nonprofit organizations to effectively engage in advocacy around their own causes and nonpartisan voter activities. The NPAction.org website will be the foundation upon which to build a one-stop website to prepare nonprofits to build capacity, to educate them on the rules of lobbying, voter engagement and the use of the media, and to provide a nationwide showcase of nonprofit advocacy campaigns.

1. Develop and distribute a request for proposals (RFP) for a technology proposal for the website to include costs of implementation. This would include the revamping of the existing website to meet the specifications of the partners and to add newer Web 2.0 tools.

2. Develop an outreach plan and budget to promote advocacy. One goal of this plan will be to evangelize about nonprofits engagement in public policy and civic activities. Social marketing tools may be incorporated into this plan. While the plan is targeted to nonprofits, it will refine target audiences within the sector.

3. Further refine our definitions of advocacy and its implications for the collective work of the partners. The definition will provide the framework for content available through the website and the types of groups the partnership will reach out to for additional content. The potential partners have already begun a discussion of a broad definition, building off the “Advocacy Cycle” (attached) developed by Gary Bass of OMB Watch. George Pillsbury of NVEN has already provided one revision to that document.

4. Secure input from selected local, state and national nonprofit leaders on what website content and services would be most helpful to strengthen nonprofit policy and civic participation. This will also serve as an opportunity to inform key leaders (e.g., Independent Sector and the Council on Foundations) about this project.

5. Identify roles each partner will play to implement the project and the costs associated with each role. It is expected that the partners will play an integral role in either providing content for the website or implementing the outreach plan. We will clarify roles of each partner. We will also identify potential advisors to the project who can serve as a “brain trust” to assist the partners in implementing this project.

6. Write a proposal if it is determined we have a partnership that can achieve the goals. The content from the proposal will be abstracted to describe this NPAction.org project. The prospectus will be shared with the leaders, who will be consulted throughout this process.

7. If time permits under this planning grant, convene the partners and potential advisors to discuss the scope of this project based on the proposal. This will serve as an opportunity to get additional feedback about the prospectus and strategies for implementation.

Citizens, government, and nonprofits need to promote and take part in MORE home raffles as a part of the solution to our economic woes. We all know that the housing crisis is at the epicenter of our current finacial times. Non-profit organized home raffles are a great way to stimulate our economy and they have proven to be a Win-Win for everyone involved. They are not the entire solution, they are simply an innovative part of it for anyone that can think ‘Out side the box’. I wrote president Obama a letter about this in his citizen's briefing book when he was taking suggestions from everyday Americans about the economy. Here is a link to what I submitted to President Obama and the details for how home raffles can benefit us all. http://www.usahomeraffle.com/PressReleases/1_26_09.asp

On the http://tutormentor.blogspot.com I demonstrate uses of maps to support the distribution of volunteers, dollars, ideas into all of the high poverty areas of Chicago where kids are being shot at on a regular basis, and where schools perform poorly in many cases because of the high poverty and lack of non-school mentoring, tutoring and learning activities in the area around each school.

Maps can be used by leaders to point resources to existing non profits meeting community needs in different neighborhoods, and can be used to identify areas where new programs are needed. Maps can also show assets, such as businesses, colleges, hospitals and faith groups in different parts of the city, who could be working to support the non profits and schools in an area.

Finally, concept maps can be used, like blueprints, to show all of the actions, and all of the non profits, that need to be sustained with flexible operating dollars, for many years, just to help each kid go from pre school, to first job.

If the President uses maps like generals use them in war, to guide troop distribution, and to build an infrastructure to support those troops with equipment, food, training, pay, etc., he can win this war.