| Every public dollar spent on family planning services saves $3 in Medicaid costs for prenatal and newborn care. |
Advance comprehensive women's health in Wisconsin by engaging, educating,
empowering and mobilizing individuals and organizations. |
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|  | | What is Advocacy? | | The dictionary defines it as "the act of speaking, writing, or acting in support of something or someone." And there are many ways you can advocate.
Advocacy can actually be quite simple. Much of advocacy is simply seeing the need and finding ways to address that need. |
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| Personal Advocacy
This includes helping individuals to get services, understand their rights, file grievances, etc. Personal advocacy ranges from sharing ideas in a support group to accompanying the person to a meeting with service providers, law enforcement personnel, bureaucrats or others. So personal advocacy is closely tied to support. |
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| Public Advocacy
Unless the public understands and sympathizes with certain issues, it will be very difficult to get officials (the public's representatives) to change and improve public policy. Every time you speak to a club, church or other organization about women's health policy, you are doing public advocacy. Every time you write a letter to the editor or send an article, you are doing public advocacy. You can see that public advocacy is part of education. |
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| Legislative Advocacy
This is the activity most of us think of when we say "advocacy." Legislative advocacy involves working to influence legislation on a national, state or local level. This includes legislation to provide more funds or to create or improve services.
Participating in legislative advocacy is easier than it sounds. Every time you write, call, or meet with your elected representatives, you are involved with legislative advocacy as an advocate. |
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| Media Advocacy
Informing the public and policy makers through the media can also be a powerful force for change. |
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| Lobbying | | You do not need to be licensed as a lobbyist if...
...you are not acting on behalf of anyone other than yourself.
...you represent the views of a business or organization but do so as an unpaid volunteer.
...you represent the views of a business or organization that pays you, but convey those views only to legislators elected from the Senate and Assembly districts in which you reside.
...you represent the views of a business or organization that pays you and you convey those views to all or many legislators or officials but do so only occassionally, up to 4 days within a 6-month period. |
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| How the Legislative Process Works | |
- The bill is introduced, often at the suggestion of a constituent, special interest group or political party pushing their agenda.
- The bill is sent to the appropriate committee, where it is debated and changes (amendments) can be made. It is then voted on and either dies, resurfaces with new amendments, or is passed as introduced and sent to the Rules Committee.
- Both the Senate and the House (or Assembly) have Rules Committees controlled by leadership in both houses. They decide when bills will reach the floor.
- Once a bill reaches the Senate or House floor, it is usually debated and then voted on. If it fails, that's the end of the bill. If it passes, it is messaged (or sent) to the other house, where it normally follows the similar committee, rules, floor process.
- If a bill makes it through both houses, it is sent to the Governor's (or President's) desk where it can be vetoed (killed), signed into law, or left alone, in which case it becomes law after 10 days. The Wisconsin Governor has strong veto powers that allow him/her to delete letters and numbers, sometimes changing the whole meaning of a bill. A two-thirds majority vote is needed in both houses to override a veto.
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| | | Currently in Wisconsin there are:
33 State Senators
18 Democrats & 15 Republicans
99 State Representatives
47 Democrats & 52 Republicans
*Note that it takes 22 Senate votes and 66 Assembly votes to override a veto by the Governor. |
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