How to make a call to your Elected Official.
Cleaning out 68 voice mails at my Office Phone has given me a certain…perspective.
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Today I took some time to clean out the Voice Mail at our campaign office. I gotta say that after listening to 68 straight voicemails, one’s faith in humanity can be questioned just a little bit. There were, of course, an incredible amount of hostile calls…all from out of state mind you, as well as a few calls from our own side of the aisle that make you wonder…what the hell are these people watching??
So, to help you out in the future, let me give you a few tips on what to do when calling a Politician’s office. These tips cover calling either a Campaign Office or a District Office.
Let’s begin, shall we?
1: Remember who you’re actually speaking to.
Even though you’re calling to talk to your local Elected, remember, YOU WON’T BE SPEAKING TO THEM DIRECTLY…at least, not at first. Odds are it’ll be someone like me or an Intern answering the call or picking up the voice mail.
So before you go into your long-winded, detailed speech about whatever the Elected is doing that you like or don’t like, remember who it is you are talking to.
2: Lead off with your name, and phone number.
This is the information that we on the receiving end need the most. If you have a problem, we‘d actually like to solve it. Be it at the District Office or the Campaign Office, we are in the habit of helping people. Helping you will entail us calling you back. If you’ve called the wrong office (like if you’ve called a campaign office and you really need to talk to the Official Office), then we REALLY need to call you back. Even if you don’t need a callback, we still need the number so we can see where we’re getting calls from. Districts tend to be big, and this data is important to where a problem is or could be. You never know.
(Side Note: Political offices usually only respond to constituent calls. I know there are a lot of times where you want to call someone else’s Senator or someone else’s Congressperson. Now, we’ll listen to the call, but that may be about it because…let’s face facts…you’re not one of our voters. There are instances…
