Peace & Planet – Massachusetts Campaign Plan

First draft - 1/18/2015

Goals of Massachusetts Peace & Planet

  • bring as many people as possible from Massachusetts to the Peace & Planet march on April 26, 2015
  • also bring people to the conference on April 24-25
  • lay the basis for ongoing work for nuclear abolition and linking nuclear abolition to issues of climate, militarism, and budget priorities

What We are Doing

Organization

Sponsor -Massachusetts Peace & Planet is a campaign initiated by Massachusetts Peace Action in cooperation with American Friends Service Committee. The pre-existing MAPA nuclear abolition working group acts as the planning group for the campaign. We connect with the international steering committee through Peace Action’s Judith LeBlanc and we are fortunate to have local access to Joseph Gerson and Sofia Wolman

Meetings - We held monthly organizing meetings on Dec 2 and Jan 5; upcoming meetings are scheduled for Feb 3 and Mar 3. The meetings feature interesting speakers who address different timely aspects of the nuclear weapons issues, followed by discussion of organizing efforts.

Outreach

Endorsements - We are reaching out, seeking speaking opportunities and organizational endorsements. Identified constituencies: (a) Youth; (b) Climate/Environmental; (c) Faith; (d) People of color

Speakers - We are fortunate to have several engaged academics and experts in our ranks who can present the case for P&P and nuclear abolition. We are seeking speaking opportunities for them in communities, churches, and campuses.

African American

(a) We made a special version of our flyer for MLK Weekend and volunteers are passing it out at their town’s MLK Day event (

(b) We are bringing Vincent Intondi - author of Afro Americans Against the Bomb ( here for a series of campus and community events on March 19-21.

Youth – (a) We will soon start up a student/youth organizing committee with students from colleges and high schools that have become interested in MAPA’s work and/or in P&P. MAPA’s student organizer AlinaMichelewicz will head up the committee with support from AFSC’s Sofia Wolman. The goal will be to hold activities on campuses and bring students to NYC. In the case of students we plan to push the conference as much as the march since we think learning opportunities draws students in.

(b) We will sponsor a youth contest to design posters and create videos promoting P&P. Donations from two generous members helped us raise the money painlessly.

Faith, Climate/Environmental – We hope to pull together committees to cohere these efforts.

Handouts – We have a general flyer (

Petition – We plan to use a petition as a key list-building tool.

Cities and Mayors – We are contacting activists in cities that have previously signed on to Mayors for Peace and asking them to sponsor City Council resolutions and get their city governments involved. This will add to our credibility and also to our local outreach. So far this year Cambridge ( and Newton ( have passed resolutions and we are trying for 6-8 more. Cambridge’s mayor is talking about sending an official delegation.

Communications

Website – We have a page on MAPA’s website ( which will act as the home page for our efforts. It has a sign-up form to build our list.

Letters to the Editor – We are drafting ideas for letters to the editor and asking our supporters to submit them, particularly to local weeklies.

Social Media – We plan to join the Fact A Day campaign when it launches. We have scheduled a social media 101 training on Feb 10 to get some of our more technologically challenged activists onto social media so that they can help spread the Facts. (Something we’ve meant to do for a while and having some material at hand helps)

E-lists – We have set up two listservs, one (discussion) for organizers and one (announcement) for contacts.

Logistics – We have committed to one bus already and are ready to start selling tickets as soon as the 4/26 schedule is set. We are seeking offers of overnight accommodation for conference attendees on 4/24-4/26 to reduce the cost of bring people to the conference.

Global Wave – At this time we are not planning to focus on organizing a Global Wave event in Mass., in order to emphasize the need for people to get to NYC.

Conference - We plan to connect our Foreign Policy for All initiative to Peace & Planet by presenting a workshop or session on FP4A at the conference

Timeline

Jan 19 – Distribute flyers at MLK events

Jan 22-27 – nuclear weapons policy seminars at MIT sponsored by Aron Bernstein – flyers

Jan 24-25 – Peace Action national organizers meeting –coordinate with other state PA groups

Feb 3- next P&P general meeting. Speaker TBA

Feb 7 – Mass PA annual meeting – P&P workshop

Feb 10 – Social Media 101 for peace activists

March 3 – P&P general meeting

March 19-21 – Vincent Intondi talks (tentative)

April 24-26 – Peace & Planet conference & march, NYC

April 27- May 22 – NPT review conference

What We Need from the National / International Committee

-Our sincere thanks and congratulations to all the national/ international organizers for starting this project. It is just the kind of national campaign we need to plug into to help us build organization locally because it is:

  • Tied to specific decision maker actions
  • Time Bound with a beginning and an end
  • Politically Broad

-Keep in Touch to Stimulate Organizers: Form an open listserv of people who are interested in supporting this effort. (That method worked great for the Peace & Justice constituency in the Peoples Climate March.) Take minutes of meetings and send them out. (I offer to start and help manage the listserv if there is not another volunteer to do it) Let us know who is heading up different tasks and work areas. Ditto, form a Facebook Group (distinct from the Page that already exists) for organizers to communicate with each other and share materials.

-Logistics: Post the time the march will assemble, a rough time you think it will end, and the time the conference will begin and end. These can be done before all details are settled, and if you end up having to adjust them later, it’s ok. It is impossible to begin serious plans to bring large numbers of people a long distance without this information.

-Petition: We need a petition as a list building tool and as a way of giving local activists something concrete to do. We like petitions that fit on a page with an image and room for people to sign, about 100 words, with a clear ask to one or more decision makers.

-Fact a Day timeline: Tell us when Fact a Day will begin. If it runs for 100 days, it should have started by now!

-Endorsements: We suggest that P&P create a way for organizations to endorse it to build participation