Interview with David Foster of Clean Water Action

• Control toxins in the environment, particularly water
• Very political - endorse certain legislative proposals, endorse political candidates, use membership
• Founder - David Zwick, Ralph Nader Protege
• Nader had a whole list of issues, Zwick picked water
• Zwick wrote Water Wasteland
  
• Clean Water Act - most successful environmental legislation (passed in 1972 and this is when Clean Water Action was formed)
• No meetings, strength of organization is in Canvassers
• Canvassers - team that goes to neighborhoods, knocking on doors (get letters, petitions, notes, donations)
• 32,000 members in Texas
• Selective in where they go - target legislators
• Texas Community Project (another organization) - focus on community like transportation, parks, etc.
• Legislature in session (81st) - Coalition for Alliance of a Clean Texas works on legislative priorities
• This year's focus: clean energy (Texas is No.1 wind state in the nation)
• Water Conservation on the local level (drought, climate change, diminishing resources effecting this)
• So many successes, especially electorally
• Austin - elected green council by 1997, recycling program for apartment complexes, pass bond initiatives
• Rhetoric - big focus on training canvassers to communication effectively
• Communication - how to frame the issue, what motivates the person being talked to, predict what public is thinking before sending canvass in
• Canvasses skilled at honing a clear and precise message, have a lot of time to spend with people
• Re-frame wording: like don't use the word "climate change" and instead focus on creating more jobs with solar energy (spinning the meaning)
• No specific age group that they're most successful with (non-partisan - water is important to everyone, so is clean energy)
  
• "We're going to knock on people's doors and interrupt their favorite television shows, but they're going to thank us. They're going to give us money and they're going to thank us."
• Bringing information that they probably wouldn't get otherwise (people too busy, news doesn't always report stories)
• Face to face communication - more valuable than phone call, tv, ad, etc.
• Several things are founded in water (energy founded in water, water is basic)