What is a grassroots effort?
Grassroots efforts are campaigns run by corporations, trade associations, and nonprofits at the local, state, and federal levels in order to advocate for a political change within their community. Grassroots efforts are an individual campaign within a wider grassroots program an organization might have. An individual grassroots effort may be inspired by the introduction of a particular bill an organization supports or opposes, an event that drives attention to a particular policy issue, or the introduction of a regulation that is open for comments.
How does a grassroots effort relate to public affairs?
Individual grassroots efforts rely on strong legislative tracking. With strong legislative tracking, you can launch a grassroots effort quickly to make change on legislation if you are acting as soon as possible after legislation is introduced or moves to a new stage in the legislative process.
For example, when COVID-19 wreaked havoc on the travel industry, AHLA used a grassroots effort to engage Congress through the voices of those directly impacted. They were able to mobilize over 20,000 people to write to Congress on COVID-19 stimulus using a grassroots strategy of having advocates share their personal stories with Congress in order to make change. While AHLA already had a regular grassroots program for typical challenges the hospitality industry deals with on a regular basis, COVID-19 provided an opportunity to spin up an individual grassroots effort on this specific issue.
