How to Organize

Pick a model resolution and get it passed by your City Council.

Okay, it’s not THAT easy, but, with simply that, you and your group could easily figure it out on your own just by going to the city and asking questions about how to do it (City Clerks are amazing people). Many groups have done just that. In fact, that could be the best way to do it, because you would learn about your city’s function in the process.

That said, while each city will have its own tweaks or quirks (which you will quickly learn), the truth is that all city councils (and other elected boards, like school boards) generally function in the same manner, so there is a set of campaign steps that will ensure a well-rounded effort.

Why a “well-rounded effort”?

A very, very, very critical point: The building of people power is actually more important than any one success (or failure).

A resolution ultimately passed because one person contacts a City Council member and suggests they do so is a “win”, but it misses the more important opportunity: that issue as a rallying point to build people power and set the group up for the next campaign. If you take a Midwest Academy training (see next section), this will be politely hammered into you.

Another critical point: It is necessary that the folks who participate are nourished by the process, not consumed by it.

Therefore, an easy direct action community organizing mantra: Every action must build your group, and nourish all who participate.

After a little bit on training, a simple process is outline below.

Because Fortify! Washington is doing the background work and generating/aggregating model resolutions, no special skills are required to begin organizing in your city. See A Basic Process Outline for an entry-level process below.

That said, seeking solid organizing training from an established training institute is ALWAYS helpful. Getting formal training would absolutely ensure your energy and time are strategic, effective, and well-spent as well as support your work, your group, and the whole movement for a more socially- and environmentally-just now.

And, especially under current circumstances, the country desperately needs more trained community organizers.

Fortify! is based on training from the Midwest Academy, an established national-level training institute with a long history.

Considered a gold standard in community organizing, the Midwest Academy was started by Heather Booth in the early 1970s. To connect that to now, it should be mentioned that she is the first name on a list of “iconic movement leaders” presented in the introduction of the 2025 book Practical Radicals,

The Midwest Academy provides regular in-person an online trainings, which are highly recommended for anyone interested in starting off on the right foot or furthering their skills as a direct action community organizer.

You can see their training schedule here: Midwest Academy Training Schedule.

This means the basic process for any local elected body would be as follows:

1. Choose an issue (i.e., pick a model resolution)
2. Start collecting petition names in support of that issue, using the hard copy and online forms. Literally anyone can add their name to a grassroots petition. (See section on Gathering Names for more info).
3. Take the model resolution to the elected body, ideally with at least a small group of people. Have folks speak from their heart on the issue and then each make this CLEAR ASK: “Please agendize and pass this resolution in two weeks.”
4. Prior to the next meeting, continue collecting names in support of the issue. Before the meeting, compile all the names in a spreadsheet (names and city only). Email that to the council and print a hard copy to give to the City Clerk at the meeting.
5. Use the names added to the petition to mobilize people to show up on the day the resolution is to be voted on, to respectfully show their support to the council members. Ask them to bring signs, and print a bunch of Fortify! signs to hand out to folks who don’t have them. Again, they can speak from the heart, ending with the CLEAR ASK: “Please pass this resolution today.” Having one speaker unfurl all the taped-together petition pages is a great visual for both the council and any media that shows up. Give the printed petition spreadsheet to the City Clerk. You can have another speaker ask the crowd to raise their signs/hands if they are here in support. It’s also impressive (and an important measure of success) to ask how many folks are at a city council meeting for the first time.
6. Regardless of the outcome of the vote (pass or fail), thank the elected officials and report the results back to the people who added their name to your petition.
7. Send the results to Fortify! Washington, so we can add them to our compiled city records, helping future voters with a resource they can use during election season.

What if they don’t agendize it in two weeks?
Repeat the first part of the process, but work to bring more people and more petition names. You can also work to meet with the councilmembers. Two tries is probably the max for a model resolution campaign. Record the results, send them to Fortify! WA for publishing, and move on.

What if they don’t pass it?
The group can either choose to try again after building more power (a Midwest Academy training would teach you how to do this) or take a break, choose another resolution/issue, and run a new model resolution campaign. You can also try to meet with the elected officials. It’s up to the group how critical a win is and how much you want to push for passage, but two escalations is probably the maximum for a model resolution campaign before you should just record the results, send them to Fortify! WA for publishing, and move on. Remember: Because both passes and fails generate a voting record, groups need not be attached to getting a resolution passed. By “failing”, you now have a voting record that can be used against those elected officials at the next election. Better to move on to the next issue, because this is about multi-issue work over time.

“When used properly, petitions are very powerful, and collecting signatures is a good organization builder as well.”

Organizing for Social Change, 4th Edition, Midwest Academy, pg 45

This is where the real power- and community-building happens. There are plenty of ways this can be done, from in-person to online – though avoid over-reliance upon online, such as emailing out or posting petition forms on social media, as it’s not as effective in name-gathering or community-building (but it is easier than having to database illegible writing! Which is why hard copy petitions include a QR code.)

Why “gathering names” and not “gathering signatures”? These are grassroots petitions, which means that they are an en masse demonstration of public opinion for the purpose of demonstrating people power to elected officials. They are not legal petitions, such as those legally required to put initiatives on a ballot or nominate an elected official. Therefore they do not need signatures, per se, and you want a clear name to be able to database.

While it’s difficult, and not always possible, gathering as much name-power as you can before the initial ask to “agendize and pass this resolution in two weeks” can help ensure that the council/staff preserve more of the language of the model resolution, because, ostensibly, that’s what The People have asked for. The city will rewrite the resolution, regardless, but without that initial show of people-power, it makes it easier for the resolution to be weakened, as it’s much harder to get them to change the resolution they propose than do it right in the first place. See Shoreline Res567, which did not have as much people-power behind its initial ask.

Critical name-gathering tips: Always “seed” a hard copy petition with a clearly printed first line. If folks start skipping fields, seed it again. Encourage folks to use the QR code, where the secure Nextcloud form will require the important information.

Here are some in-person suggestions for gathering names:

1. Tabling in public places like the library, grocery stores, etc. The old ironing-board-as-a-signature-gathering-table is a classic old-school community organizing tactic. Always ask permission, especially when gathering petition names on private property (like grocery stores).
2. At mass mobilizations. See the section below on the critical opportunity of mass mobilizations, as well as the very real risk of protest fatigue.
3. At other protests, rallies, sign-waving tactics.

NEVER sign a legal petition for something you have not fully vetted and ACTUALLY SUPPORT just to “put it on the ballot so the people can vote.” Moneyed interests leverage this well-intentioned but misguided habit of wanting to be “democratic” to get things put on ballots that are, at best, not in your best interest and, at worst, actually horrible. They’re hoping that, once approved for the ballot, their money and voter ignorance will result in its actual passing. This results in the tremendous waste of people’s time and money to fight down terrible proposals which, if passed, could cause great harm and require costly lawsuits to overturn.

The whole point of the State requiring the general public to sign legal petitions for proposed initiatives/referendums is to determine if people actually want what is being proposed – it’s the first line of vetting of something a group wishes to put up for a vote. By signing it you’re saying you approve of it.

Your signature is the first layer of approval for an initiative or candidate. Who is the group behind it? What are their values? What is their end game? If you don’t know these things and ACTUALLY support it or them, DO NOT SIGN IT. You can’t go wrong sticking to supporting organizations you already trust and have vetted. Don’t let a paid signature gatherer startle or bully you in to agreeing to something you will regret agreeing to.

Questions to ask a legal petition signature gatherer:

1. What group is behind this?
2. Are you being paid? By whom?
3. Do not ask: What is the initiative about? They will give you their talking points, which are just that, talking points.
4. And then, unless you are already familiar with that group and support the effort, say, “I’ll look into it and sign later, if I support the effort.”
5. Walk away.

[End Rant]

Mass mobilizations are amazing opportunities to springboard strategically-planned community organizing. Model resolutions can be chosen to meet the moment of the mass resolution, taking the energy for a particular cause and directing it towards concrete results.

They are a tremendous opportunity to capture people power and direct it like a laser towards moving an actual political needle,

Unfortunately, while mass mobilizations like the more recent No Kings and Hands Off and the Climate Strike of way back have been visibly powerful, they most often end up “terminal tactics” (Saul Alinsky), by rarely (as in never) including a viable target (decision-maker) and clear demands, necessary elements of direct action community organizing. The Midwest Academy Strategy Chart is a straightforward but powerful tool that covers this integration.

The good news is that Fortify! was actually initially conceived to add this facet to a local manifestation of the 2019 Climate Strike mass mobilization, and you can do the same thing by adding it to any mass mobilization (or any other tactic, for that matter) in your city. Event organizers and community organizers are not the same thing, though they definitely can, and should, support each others’ work.

Fortify! is a puzzle piece that helps complete the organizing picture.

If you would like to leverage the opportunity of a local mass mobilization towards influencing the local city council (or any other local body, for that matter), find out what group has taken on the task of organizing the event and talk to them.

This is harder in big cities (i.e. Seattle), because those events are simply overwhelming: they are huge, there are organizers everywhere, attendees will be overwhelmed, and everyone’s effort risks being diluted. The only way to effectively capture the power of events of that size is to have a ton of volunteers all over (sanctioned or unsanctioned by the event organizers) or have an in with the event organizers such that you announce your effort over the sound system, repeatedly.

Mass mobilizations in smaller cities, however, are amazing opportunities that are much more accessible, as, typically, are the organizers. Ask them if you can have a table at their event and use their sound system to announce your model resolution. If you have a sound system of your own to offer up and run, it’s an excellent way get your group’s work connected to the event organizers’, and nobody says the person who brings the PA can’t announce their effort and encourage folks to come to their action table.

That said, event organizers in smaller cities still have the choice to make those events targeted actions or the equivalent of non-profit festivals, the latter of which also dilutes the ability of the event to substantively move a single political needle..

Ideally, event organizers are either working with community organizers or have community organizing training themselves, such that they understand the critical importance of a targeted tactic and the strategic planning involved in such a tactic. For any organizing nerds out there, see how this Strategy Chart for a Tactic from the Midwest Academy plots that out.

Please respect folks’ personal data. If you’re collecting names, emails, and phone numbers, as all community organizers must do, please keep hard copies in a secure place and digital copies in a secure digital environment.

Fortify! Washington has its digital assets set up through the May First Technology Cooperative, which has its own servers and uses its own instances of software (like Nextcloud, WordPress, and Mailman for email lists). Any names that come through the Nextcloud form are secure on their servers.

While your group may choose to keep the contact information you collect to yourselves, that disconnects your effort from the larger Fortify! effort. And be aware that sending bulk emails out by :bcc or :cc is not only a messy way to manage emails to groups, but it puts your email at risk of being labeled SPAM and grey or blacklisted by service providers. So if you wish to manage your own contact emails, you will need to look into something such as Google Groups (free, but Google) or an email marketing service, which generally costs money because their free versions allow so few contacts.

Fortify! Washington uses CiviCRM and Mailman through the May First Technology Cooperative. If we manage your email list for you through one of those services, it can remain stable, secure, and connected to the larger Fortify! movement. Talk to us about your options. This is, of course, free to the community as a service.

The process of running campaigns around model resolutions is your most powerful community-building tool, and should be the primary activities of the group. Folks need to feel that their time is being spent productively, so things like strictly social gatherings or informational sessions shouldn’t outweigh work done towards a specific goal.

However, complementing that work with other activities to engage and cultivate the group is critical.

Here are some ideas:

• Ask folks who are interested to join a committee that monitors a particular local elected body, with those committees reporting back to the larger group at monthly meetings. This helps keep the group connected to the goings on of the local bodies, and the local bodies see that the group is regularly showing up to their meetings. Wearing shirts or big buttons would make that very clear, as well as promote the group and its work.
• Take trainings together. These could be Midwest Academy trainings. They could be protest skills (safety teams, de-escalation, event organizing, etc.). They could be personal development trainings, to help nourish participants through strategic self-care. Organizing is hard work, people can get burned out and sick, and burned out/sick is good neither for them nor the effort. Just make sure your trainings are from established and respected sources and institutes. There are a lot of self-taught people out there putting on trainings, and that muddies the waters of solid organizing. Again, the Midwest Academy Trainings can be found here.
• Have weekly or monthly socials. No decision-making. No agendas. Just hanging out.
• Volunteer together on direct service work. Working with our hands and doing concrete benefit is its own soul salve, and direct service is becoming more and more critical as our government continues to destroy our institutions. Direct service/Mutual Aid is also what it means to fortify ourselves as a community. Just remember that direct action is about changing the circumstances that result in the need for direct service in the first place, so don’t let it drain energy from your work for systemic change.

The lexicon of community organizing can be confusing because of inconsistent definitions, which is also why it’s very helpful to get community organizing training from an established, national-level organization with a solid history and lineage (like, again, the Midwest Academy).

One set of distinctions: Activists, event organizers, community organizers, direct lobbyists, and electoral campaigners are different. They may overlap or share skill sets, but just because an individual or group engages in one of these activities or occupations does not at all mean they understand the others.

Another set of distinctions is the methods of addressing social issues (as defined by the Midwest Academy): direct service (aka traditional charity), self-help (aka mutual aid), education, advocacy, and direct action community organizing.

All of these methods involve organizing people in some way, but they fall on a critical spectrum: the ones toward the beginning (direct service) accept the current relations of power, while the ones toward the end (direct action) challenge the current relations of power. The former fights the fires. The latter seeks to stop the arsonist. While one group can engage in more than one method, groups and organizations best serve their goals when they focus by clearly deciding who they are, rather than bouncing around among these variations without a clear plan.

Fortify! Washington fits squarely in direct action organizing, seeking to streamline the work and increase the impact by systematizing the process and not reinventing the wheel.

Contact us. Clearly we love talking about organizing. We’re happy to help: info (at) fortifywa.org

If you are interested in also giving direct input on Washington State legislation, it might be helpful to get familiar with the Washington State Legislature website and the Washington State Legislature Account system. While the website is fairly straightforward, creating and navigating a WSL account is not, though helpful to track your history of certain input on legislation.

You don’t have to create an account to give input on bills, but it can help you track certain kinds of input.

There are two parts. “leg.wa.gov” is the main WSL website. “app.leg.wa.gov” is the WSL Account website. The main website sends you to the app website for things that can be tracked by your account. It can get very, very confusing, so here are some bookmarks for you. Also, they use the term “sign in” to mean give input on the bill, as well as “sign in” (log in) to your account. More confusing.

Main Washington State Legislature Website: https://leg.wa.gov/

Parts of the website you can be logged in for:
Sign in/Sign Up for An Account (“log in”): Super Crazy Long URL
Bill Information: https://app.leg.wa.gov/bi
Committee Sign In (“pro” or “con”): https://app.leg.wa.gov/csi
Your “Sign-In” (“pro” or “con”) History: https://app.leg.wa.gov/csi/UserTestimony/History

It’s best to log in to your account first, and then use the main website to search for the bills (by number) about which you want to give input. If there is a button that says “Sign up to Testify / Submit Written Testimony”, it means there is an upcoming hearing, and this is where being logged in helps. Hitting that button will take you to your Account where you can “sign in” (“pro” or “con”), provide written testimony, or even sign up to attend the hearing on that bill. If you sign in “pro” or “con” it will record that in your history, so you can see what you’ve already done.