Volume 2, Issue 2 February 25, 2006 |
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In This Issue:
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PLANET BIKE INCREASES THUNDERHEAD SUPPORT TO $100,000 IN 2006! Planet
Bike has been Thunderhead’s most committed supporter since our earliest
days. Their founder and CEO Bob Downs was one of the very few back then
who could truly see the brilliance of Thunderhead’s potential to grow
bicycling because we serve the most important players in our movement:
you - leaders of bicycle and pedestrian advocacy organizations at the
state and local level. Jay Ferm, Planet Bike’s Advocacy Coordinator,
gave Sue a call in late January with this extraordinary news torturing
her to keep the secret for a full week until he could personally
announce this new pledge on stage with her at the Bicycle Leadership
Conference on January 31st.
Here’s what Jay told Bicycle Retailer and Industry News: “Planet Bike is upping our contribution to Thunderhead because these are the people who will translate the $3.5 billion for bikes in the recent SAFETEA-LU federal transportation bill into bike facilities, programs and bike-able communities. Their work creates our customers.” With Planet Bike’s increased support added to the significant support we receive from the National Bicycle Dealers Association as well as our members and other supporters, Thunderhead is ramping up our programs for 2006 to bring all of you more and improved services and connect you to the building momentum of our National Complete the Streets Campaign. |
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THUNDERHEAD'S NATIONAL COMPLETE THE STREETS CAMPAIGN RAMPS UP Thunderhead is taking our next big steps for this campaign as we initiate concerted assistance efforts with our member organizations in states that have a long way to go before securing a state or local level complete streets policy. We are also continuing our assistance to all of you for your own complete streets policies so that all of our member organizations will reap the benefits of these policies and no longer have to fight for each and every facility. We launched this national campaign at the end of 2004 with a goal of working with all of our member organizations to secure at least one complete streets policy at the state or local level in every state by 2008 in time to leverage these policies to secure a federal complete streets policy through the reauthorization of SAFETEA-LU. We used the first year to gather info on existing policies and the resistance that many of you are facing in trying to win these policies. We captured early info in our first edition of our Guide to Complete Streets Campaigns and posted our initial findings on our Complete the Streets web page: http://www.thunderheadalliance.org/completestreets.htm. In the coming weeks our update of the Guide with intriguing new findings will go into production through a mainstream publisher and will be available on-line through all major booksellers in April. This huge step for our campaign is coupled with our designation of first states to receive our assistance for their campaigns. In the next issue of the Weather Report we’ll let you know the latest with these exciting efforts. And if you have any news about your own complete streets policy campaigns or if you need our assistance, please email Sue Knaup, Executive Director at: sue@thunderheadalliance.org. |
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MEMBER NEWS: COMPLETE STREETS SUCCESS STORIES Ed Barsotti, the Executive Director of the League of Illinois Bicyclists (http://www.bikelib.org) is well on his way to winning a Complete Streets policy for the Illinois Department of Transportation. "We took a two-pronged approach," notes Barsotti. "We have been working at a grass-roots level and with our legislators. For the grass-roots approach, we provide a way for our constituency to comment on upcoming road projects through our website. On the legislative level, we were able to get a Complete Streets bill passed in the State Senate last year (41-13). Our next challenge is to get the bill passed by the House. With this momentum, we and the Chicagoland Bicycle Federation met with IDOT and the Governor's staff and asked for an administrative adoption of this policy. The Governor's administration says that they are interested." When asked about some of the barriers that LIB has faced along the way, Barsotti noted the traditional institutional resistance to change, the opinion that bike/ped accommodations are diversions, and confusion about what a Complete Streets policy would actually cost the state. "We also looked at the "Thunderhead's Guide to Complete Streets Campaigns" to see what had worked for other organizations. It helped us to pick out the best strategies from other organization's experiences." For more information on LIB's grass-roots approach, visit their "Complete Streets" section of their website at: http://www.bikelib.org/completestreets. There is a wonderful interactive map showing Illinois road projects. To date, 200 surveys and 400 letters have been submitted showing the demand for Complete Streets. For more information on LIB's legislative approach, you can download information on Illinois Senate Bill 508 (SB508) here: http://www.bikelib.org/completestreets/leginfo.pdf. "We emphasize that meeting the safety needs of other road users is NOT a 'diversion' - it's a basic part of a project. If the incremental money is not available to a road project 'right', then it shouldn't be done at all!" Here are just a few additional Thunderhead organizations (of many) working hard to win and/or improve Complete Streets policies in their communities:
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ORG TIP: INCREASING MEMBERSHIP RENEWALS News flash: people are flaky. Even those stellar folks who had the wisdom and dedication to part with their hard-earned cash to join your organization, sometimes, are just plain flaky. This is important to remember when you wonder why so many don’t renew their memberships. It’s not that they don’t want to, it’s that they just haven’t gotten around to it yet. Helping your flaky members to pay their annual dues is one of the most important things you can do to maintain a large membership, that all-important base of support for successful campaigns and financial sustainability. If you’re a new organization, your membership probably consists of the hardcore early joiners, and your renewal rate should exceed 80%. More mature organizations should expect renewal rates closer to two-thirds. Here are some tips to help you increase membership renewals, and help your flaky members do their duty. 1. Ask them to renew again and again. Five times is not too many. One Thunderhead group even asks seven times, if you count email appeals, and they’ve reaped an army of 5,400 dues-paying members and a budget of over $400,000 because of it. Start with a request 4-6 weeks before their membership expires, and ask again and again until six months or more after their membership expires, when you transfer their name back to your list of prospects. 2. Use email. Consider sending your first renewal request by email, including a link to your online donation page. Another request among your multiple appeals should also be by email, to get those people who received your letter but put it in the "to do later" pile on their desk. 3. Use the telephone. After you’ve tried several times by snail-mail and e-mail, call them on the phone. Host a volunteer night where your most articulate volunteers call up your lapsed members on the phone, pen ready, to take down a credit card number for renewal, or to address an envelope with a membership form in it with a note from the caller attached, “nice talking with you - glad you’re gonna renew!” There’s nothing like confronting a well-intentioned flaky person with a real live person prepared to facilitate their renewal! In sum, ask and ask again. Ask by email and ask by telephone. It’s your job as an advocate to respect people as they are, in all their flakiness, and help them to do their duty as concerned residents and pay their dues to your organization! Don’t be shy about being a nuisance; that’s your duty! (You’ll note this advice assumes you have the ability to accept credit cards. If you don’t have that ability, get it today. Call Dave Snyder, Director of Program Development at: (415) 216-7393, or email: dave@livablecity.org for advice on setting that up.) NEWSLETTER CUT AND PASTE: WHAT ARE COMPLETE STREETS? You know what it means when people refer to complete streets, but what about the readers of your newsletter? We're providing a primer that you can reprint in your newsletter and/or post on your website. Don't forget to put your organization's information in the [brackets]! Complete Streets - Safe Roads For ALL Users: The Basics You Need To Know We're sure you've noticed how the majority of our community’s streets are designed to move speeding cars as fast as possible. Bike lanes, sidewalks, and traffic calming devices (speed bumps, medians, etc) seem in many cases to be an afterthought. A national movement to complete our streets is building. Complete streets are designed and operated to enable safe access for all users. Pedestrians, bicyclists, motorists and transit riders of all ages and abilities enjoy moving along and across a complete street and [your organization] is tapping this national movement to bring complete streets home! [This paragraph for organizations that are already pursuing a complete streets policy.] [Insert your organization here] is working to secure a complete streets policy at the [local or state] level. This policy, once adopted, will help to ensure that all citizens can use our streets without compromising their safety or dignity. Find out what you can do to help us get this policy in place by contacting us! We need your help! [Provide your contact information.] To date, only 7 states have passed a complete streets policy at the state level and only a handful of states enjoy the benefits of local-level complete streets policies [including your community?]. The Thunderhead Alliance, the national coalition of which [your organization] is a proud member, has launched their National Complete the Streets Campaign to ensure that all states reap the benefits of complete streets policies. Please contact us to find out how you can help us [either pass the policy or implement the existing policy]. For more information on complete streets, visit Thunderhead’s Complete the Streets web page at: http://www.thunderheadalliance.org/completestreets.htm and the complete streets website at: http://www.completestreets.org. |
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This monthly Thunderhead Alliance Weather Report is for the leaders of our member organizations and our supporters. The Thunderhead Alliance, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, is the only coalition of state and local bicycle and pedestrian advocacy organizations working in unison to break down the barriers to safe bicycling and walking in North American communities. Find more info at: www.thunderheadalliance.org |