Global Weekly Update February 11, 2013
Call President Obama on Valentine’s Day! Tell Him: No Cuts to the Global Fund!
In his State of the Union address, President Obama spoke about fighting global poverty by “realizing the promise of an AIDS-free generation.” For the first time, we have the science and experience to stop HIV/AIDS and end the epidemic as we know it.
But the White House is considering cutting back on its commitment to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria in its next budget proposal. The Global Fund is the leading international partnership dedicated to fighting these three diseases around the world. Global Fund-supported programs for prevention, treatment, and care are estimated to save 3,600 lives per day — or over 1.3 million lives per year.
These life-or-death budget decisions will be made in the coming days. Make a call on Thursday, Valentine’s Day.
Appropriations Work Begins!
Foreign Operations Appropriations is the most important annual legislative opportunity to increase resources for improving the health and livelihood of the poorest around the world. This legislation provides funding for global health and nutrition programs, basic education, microfinance, and other development assistance. Even while Congress is still working to finish the fiscal year (FY) 2013 budget, attention is turning to the FY 2014 spending process. Both during the current budget negotiations and the upcoming FY13 appropriations process, Congress must protect foreign assistance funding.
Each and every member of Congress can have an important voice in shaping this bill by writing to and speaking with committee leadership before they begin drafting the spending legislation. Many of you are meeting face-to-face with your members of Congress as part of relationship-building. Don’t hesitate to use the February action sheet as you prepare for your meeting and plan to make FY14 appropriations requests of your representative and senators. You’ll be asking your members of Congress to weigh in on appropriations, passing your requests on to the Chair (from majority party) and Ranking Member (from minority party) of the House/Senate Foreign Operations Appropriations Subcommittees. The action sheet will spell out how to accomplish this in detail.
Keep in mind that you don’t have to make a request for every issue we cover. If your member of Congress has a particular interest in one or two issue areas, feel free to emphasize those.
For a history of our appropriations requests over time, individual fact sheets for each of our five requests, and more information on the federal budget and appropriations processes, check out our Appropriations page online.
For more help on framing your requests for members of Congress who don’t seem to be in favor of our issues, check out help from our recent webinar on building relationships with members of Congress and join us for a Building Bipartisan Champions cohort support call on Monday, March 4, at 8 pm. You can dial (712) 432-3100, passcode 761262 to join these calls we plan to host every other month. These calls will be designed to help you define the tools you need to plan a way to empower your members of Congress to be a catalyst toward a world where poverty no longer exists.
Finally, for some more information and inspiration related to this work, straight from Representative Nita Lowey (NY), listen to our February conference call recording!
On Wednesday, February 27 at 11 am ET, there will be a webinar discussing and describing the findings of the report, presented by Larry Reed of the Microcredit Summit Campaign and others. Registration for the webinar will be going live on Wednesday, February 13. This webinar will open with news from a recently released report from the Microcredit Summit Campaign, Vulnerability: The State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report, 2013, that microfinance providers reached 13 million fewer poorest clients in 2011 than in 2010. This decline was almost exclusively in India as a result of the 2010 crisis in Andhra Pradesh. Our panelists, Chandra Shekhar (“CS”) Ghosh, chairman and managing director of Bandhan in India, and Professor Luisa Brunori, full professor and director of the International Microfinance Observatory at the University of Bologna in Italy, will look at that crisis from the client’s perspective. For more information, check out the webinar series details online.
Grassroots News You Can Use
1. Registration for the 2013 Results International Conference Is Open!
2. Group Planning Forms Are Due February 15.
Thank you for your aspirational work!
3. World TB Day Mini-grant Applications Due February 20!
Apply Now for a World TB Day mini-grant to help you with costs associated with putting on an outreach event. There’s a tight turnaround for the application process, so take a look at the application today and turn in your application right away!
4. Partner with the Global Poverty Project
Read on our blog how your RESULTS group can be part of the Global Poverty Project’s 2013 Spring Tour, helping bring to your community awareness and action for the end of poverty! The tour kicked off this weekend. Want to go see their presentation in your town? Want to offer their audience an action they can take at the end of their presentation? Want to bring their presentation to another location in your town? Check out our blog for more information!
You can also read more great tips about building partnerships with the ONE Campaign and others as well as consider showing a great film on poverty at a future outreach event. It’s all on our blog.
5. Fundraising
Read about four great top tips on fundraising in a new RESULTS blog post. Then please help out your fellow RESULTS partners holding March fundraisers by sharing their fundraisers with people you know in their areas! You can even link to their websites for a way to donate online.
- March 2: Arlington, VA, House Party with Zambian activist Luwiza Makukula
- March 3: Laurel, MD, House Party with Zambian activist Luwiza Makukula
- March 9: Chicago, IL, House Party with Musician Ella Gill
- March 10 (New Date): Salt Lake City, UT, Evening with Muhammad Yunus
Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.
— William James
1. February 13, 8 pm ET. (Please note the corrected time). RESULTS Website Tour. Dial (712) 432-3100, passcode 761262 to join this informative call. Please note the corrected time.
2. February 13, 9 pm ET. RESULTS Introductory Call. Please RSVP for the call so we can welcome you. Dial-in number: (712) 432-3100, passcode 761262.
3. February 22, 1 pm ET. RESULTS Introductory Call. Please RSVP for the call so we can welcome you. Dial-in number: (712) 432-3100, passcode 761262.
4. February 27, 9 pm ET. From Zero to Hero: Moving Your Lawmakers Up the Champion Scale Webinar. Click http://tinyurl.com/RESULTSZero2Hero to join the webinar. For audio, join via your computer at link, or dial (775) 996-3560, room # 796141. RESULTS’ most critical relationship-building work is with our members of Congress. We build these relationships so that we can influence how they understand and act on issues of poverty. But how do we know when we are making progress? How do we know what to do next to move them further along the path of support and leadership on these critical issues? Join this call to learn about using the Champion Scale to help you in making the progress you want to make.
5. March 4, 8 pm. Building Bipartisan Champions Cohort Call. You can dial (712) 432-3100, passcode 761262 to join these calls we plan to host every other month. Do you have a member of Congress who seems not to be open to our issues? Feel blocked at every turn? These calls will be designed to help you define the tools you need to plan a way to empower your members of Congress to be a catalyst toward a world where poverty no longer exists.
6. March 9, 2 pm ET. RESULTS National Grassroots Conference Call for Global Poverty Campaigns featuring Representative Nita Lowey (NY). Dial (888) 409-6709 to join.
7. March 18, 8 pm ET. RESULTS Free Agents call for global poverty advocates. (218) 486-1611, passcode 7378587 (RESULTS). Are you a RESULTS activist with our global poverty campaigns, living in a town with no RESULTS group? You are alone no more! Contact Lisa Marchal for more information on this monthly group call.
8. July 20–23, 2013. RESULTS International Conference in Washington, DC. Dr. Muhammad Yunus and author/speaker Marianne Williamson are already set to join us. Mark your calendar now!