Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Workshop Session 1: 1:45pm – 2:45pm

A Real Happy Meal  
What are the elements that would be in the ideal food system? Are they compatible or in conflict? Passionate advocates for reform of our food safety system will describe what we need to move towards a more sustainable food system in the US.       
Moderator: Jean Halloran, Director, Food Policy Initiatives, Consumers Union
Panelists: Paul Shapiro, Human Society of the United States; Rick North, Physicians for Social Responsibility, campaigner against hormones and antibiotics in milk; Jill Richardson, blogger La Vida Locavore and author of Recipe for America: Why Our Food System is Broken and What We Can Do to Fix It; Donna Rosenbaum, Safe Tables Our Priority (invited)
 Room: North Carolina

There’s No Such Thing as a Free Call
After paying hundreds of dollars, why can’t you take your cell phone with you after leaving your service provider? Your laptop can connect to the Internet through any company, why don’t cell phones work on every network? The costs to consumers associated with wireless service are a result of public policies that have failed to foster meaningful competition among providers. Come find out what is being done to help free your phone and lower your cell phone bill.     
Moderator: Joel Kelsey, Associate Policy Analyst at Consumers Union
Panelists:  Chris Libertelli from Skype; Chris Riley from Free Press; Eric Graham from Cellular South
Room: South Carolina

National Level Advocacy: Communicating with Congress
After you have spent time on Capitol Hill, let’s talk about what worked, what didn’t and how to be an effective activist on the federal stage.
Presenter: Ellen Bloom, Director, Federal Policy and Washington Office at Consumers Union
Room: Pennsylvania

How to Get Your Message out through the Media
The media is an invaluable tool for creating change. This workshop will cover the basics on how to make sure your message gets heard when you're being interviewed by a reporter. We'll go over the fundamentals, do a mock interview, and leave room for your questions.
Presenters: Ken Weine, Vice President, Communications at Consumers Union; Michael McCauley, Media Director at Consumers Union; David Butler, Communications Director at Consumers Union and Kristina Edmunson, Media Relations Associate at Consumers Union
Room: New York

How to Testify
Speaking before others, particularly government officials, about one’s experience and passion for change may be natural for some, but the rest of us may require some additional skills. This workshop is lead by Director of CU’s West Coast Office and State Campaigns, and Policy Counsel in CU’s Washington, DC Office, both of whom have testified extensively before Congress, state legislators, and federal and state agencies, and one food safety activist who testified for the first time last year. This workshop will help guide you so that you too can stand before a legislative body, and testify confidently and effectively.
Presenters: Elisa Odabashian, Director of Consumers Union's West Coast Office and State Campaigns, Ami Gadhia, Policy Counsel in Consumers Union’s Washington, DC Office, and Peter Hurley, Portland police officer, father of food contamination victim, and food safety activist who testified before Congress on contamination of peanut products.
 Room: Ohio

Climate Change: The Consumer Perspective
Will efforts to curb greenhouse gases really raise energy costs for consumers?  Does the climate change bill offer consumers more and greener energy choices?  Find out the scoop about policymakers' intentions on the sweeping new energy bill.  Hear how federal climate change proposals will impact consumer options and energy prices.  
Moderator: Shannon Baker-Branstetter, Policy Analyst at Consumers Union
Panelists: Olivia Wein, National Consumer Law Center (NCLC) and Mark Cooper, Consumer Federation of America
Room: Florida

Workshop Session 2: 3:00pm – 4:00pm

Closing the Gap: Why You Pay for the Internet
Large segments of the nation - many rural areas, and among low and moderate-income households - do not have access to affordable broadband services. Without access to broadband, these communities are cut off from participating in new models of economic expansion and growth.  Find out what’s being done to close this digital divide and how you can help bring your community online.
Moderator: Joel Kelsey, Associate Policy Analyst at Consumers Union
Panelists: Rick Whitt from Google; Sascha Meinrath from New America Foundation; and Parul Desai from Media Access
Room: North Carolina

Toxins Around Us 
What are the toxics in products in the home and what can we do about them?  Consumer products pose hazards long understood, like lead, and entirely new, like nano particles.  What are the hazards in our everyday consumer products and how can we make them safer for people and the environment?
Moderator: Ami Gadhia, Policy Counsel in Consumers Union’s Washington, DC Office
Panelists: Rachel Weintraub, Consumer Federation of America; Richard Wiles, Environmental Working Group (invited), Jennifer Sass, Natural Resources Defense Council, and Daniel Penchina, The Raben Group (invited)
Room: South Carolina

Nuts and Bolts of Social Networking
How can we use social networking to publicize our issues and get others to take action? This workshop will provide a context for joining some of the most popular sites like Facebook and Twitter and how these sites can help you connect with fellow supporters and gain new ones. Join us for a basic introduction to online tools you can use for building your own social network and keeping it active. I will show you step-by-step how to create a social networking profile from scratch and what to do next.
 Presenters: Daniela Nunez, Grassroots Organizer at Consumers Union and Meghann Marco, Co-Managing Editor at The Consumerist
Room: Pennsylvania

How to Get Your Message out through the Media
The media is an invaluable tool for creating change. This workshop will cover the basics on how to make sure your message gets heard when you're being interviewed by a reporter. We'll go over the fundamentals, do a mock interview, and leave room for your questions.
Presenters: Ken Weine, Vice President, Communications at Consumers Union; Michael McCauley, Media Director at Consumers Union; David Butler, Communications Director at Consumers Union and Kristina Edmunson, Media Relations Associate at Consumers Union
Room: New York

Who will speak for the people? Effectively Representing Consumer Interests
Active, outspoken public interest advocates are essential to effective advisory committees to federal, state, and local governmental agencies. This is often required by law, but finding the right consumer/public representatives is a challenge. And, what do you do once you get appointed? Find out how to get appointed to and how to be an effective consumer representative. Make your voice a strong one for the public.
Presenter: Lisa McGiffert, Campaign Manager, Consumers Union Safe Patient Project
Room: Ohio

The Right Climate for Renewables?
Will efforts to curb greenhouse gases really raise energy costs for consumers?  Does the climate change bill offer consumers more and greener energy choices?  Find out the scoop about policymakers' intentions on the sweeping new energy bill.  Hear how federal climate change proposals will impact consumer options and energy prices.  
Moderator: Shannon Baker-Branstetter, Policy Analyst at Consumers Union
Panelists: Chris Stimpson, SolarNation and Ben Larson, Union of Concerned Scientists
Room: Louisiana

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Workshop Session 3: 11:30am – 12:30pm

How To Kickstart An Online Revolution
The web is a powerful force for launching grassroots campaigns but all too often we toss up our impassioned causes only to be frustrated when they fail to make an impact. Ben Popken, Co-Managing Editor of the most popular, and dangerous, consumer blog Consumerist.com, reveals essentials insights and tips from the frontlines of the online consumer revolution for tapping the power of the internet to advance consumer causes. Ben draws lessons from real Consumerist stories that have made a real difference in a lively and fun discussion with great takeaway value for every activist, regardless of previous online experience.
Presenter: Ben Popken, Co-Managing Editor at The Consumerist
Room: North Carolina

Health Care Reform: An Update From Congress & Where We Go From Here.
In the last few weeks, Congress has been trying to figure out how to move forward on health reform. At the same time, special interests have been out in full force trying to defeat any bill from passing. Find out more about the reforms included in the bills in Congress and why the next few weeks are critical to getting a strong bill passed.
Moderator: DeAnn Friedholm, Director on Health Reform, Consumers Union
Panelists: Lynn Quincy, Senior Health Policy Analyst, Consumers Union and Jessica McNiece, Health Legislative Aide, Senator Sherrod Brown
Room: South Carolina

No more meltdowns, no more ripoffs. Winning a Consumer Financial Protection Agency and what it will do to stop bad practices by banks and other lenders
Learn about the proposal for a new federal watchdog to stop bad bank practices at the start. This Consumer Financial Protection Agency will develop rules that apply to every type of lender to stamp out unfair practices when they start, instead of after they get big enough to wreck our economy. Learn what you can do to get a real watchdog in Washington over financial practices, and keep your state active to protect you too.
Presenters: Gail Hillebrand, Sr. Attorney, Financial Services Campaign Manager at Consumers Union and Pamela Banks, Senior Attorney, Program Manager at Consumers Union
Room: Pennsylvania

Grassroots Action: Brainstorming Telecom and Media
Join an exciting dialogue with passionate activists and experts who care deeply about telecom and media reform to brainstorm grassroots activities. Come share creative ideas and make new friends!
Presenters: Joel Kelsey, Associate Policy Analyst at Consumers Union
Room: New York

The Revolution will be Tweeted (or How I stopped worrying and learned to love social media): A conversation on advocacy through Social Media
With millions of active users, social networking has proven it is here to stay for a while. Ideally it is supposed to make it easier to identify potential supporters and organize them to action. However social networking can often prove to be cumbersome, overwhelming and a seemingly endless time suck sometimes with out tangible benefits. However, its full potential has yet to be realized. Right now, advocacy and activists are still experimenting with social media to understand how this new medium can be harnessed in the most efficient manner in order to organize and apply pressure to decision makers in a more traditional sense. Sites like MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr and Twitter allow you to share information rapidly and visually, but what tools does each site offer to your organizing mission, and how do they all fit together? For beginners we would like to help map out a clear approach to make social media less confusing and overwhelming. For current users we would like to ask for your help in this as well as have a conversation about how to best harness this format and where you see it heading in the future.
Presenters: Tim Marvin, Grassroots Organizer at Consumers Union and Marc Perton, Executive Editor, Online Media for Consumers Union
Room: Virginia

Workshop Session 4: 1:45pm – 2:45pm

Building Powerful, Respectful and Strategic Alliances with Communities of Color
What is the most effective way to build a relationship with communities of color in the area where you live and work? What are the strengths and challenges of engaging diverse communities in meaningful ways? This workshop will examine successful strategies, lessons-learned, and resources that could serve as a bridge to better engage with communities of color around consumer issues.
Presenters: Joel Kelsey, Associate Policy Analyst at Consumers Union; Amalia Deloney, from the Media Action Grassroots Network and Edyael Casaperalta from the Center for Rural Strategies
Room: North Carolina

How to get dangerous products OUT and safety information IN to homes
We will take a look at product hazards, recalls and the reasons why most recalled and potentially dangerous products stay in the home. We discuss how to get this information into households and the newly formed School Safety Alert Program. We will learn how Consumers Union is working with new partners, The National PTA and the National School Boards Association to reach educators, school administrators, and parent organizations across the country by working together to alert families to the product dangers in and around them. How can you get involved and how you can help get this important safety information into homes and schools and dangerous products out of these environments.
Presenters: Jamie Schaefer-Wilson Manager, Multimedia Outreach Programs at Consumers Union and the author of The Baby Rules: The Insider's Guide to Raising Your Parents
Room: South Carolina

Grassroots Action: Networking with Patient Safety Advocates
Join an exciting dialogue with passionate activists and experts who care deeply about patient safety. Come make new friends!
Presenters: Lisa McGiffert, Campaign Manager, Patient Safety at Consumers Union and the rest of the Patient Safety Team
Room: Pennsylvania

Moving Issues Through Citizen Action
Are there issues you want to address in your community? Want to learn how others have been successful? Consumers Union staff and activists will discuss the tools and tactics for building support and visibility for the issues they care about at the local, state and national levels. They’ll share what worked (and what didn’t) and how their efforts moved the issue.
Presenters: Meg Bohne, Grassroots Organizer at Consumers Union; Blake Hutson, Grassroots Organizer at Consumers Union; Cindy Shawcross, health reform activist from Fargo, ND; and Jaimee Napp, identity theft activist from Omaha, NE
Room: Florida

Grassroots Action: Brainstorming Financial Services
Join an exciting dialogue with passionate activists and experts who care deeply about financial services to brainstorm grassroots activities. Come share creative ideas and make new friends!
Presenters: Gail Hillebrand, Sr. Attorney, Financial Services Campaign Manager at Consumers Union and the rest of the Financial Services Team
Room: Virginia

Workshop Session 5: 3:00pm – 4:00pm

Deadly Health Care Secrets and What You Can Do About Them
Each year, millions of Americans are injured by medical harm- preventable errors and hospital infections - and over 100,000 die from that harm and most of the time - they are kept secret. But publicly reporting these errors will go a long way in improving the safety of our health care system. Find out more about efforts in Congress and the states to shine a light on these problems and how you can help.
Presenters: Lisa McGiffert, Suzanne Henry, Daniela Nunez, Consumer Union Safe Patient Project team
Room: North Carolina

Grassroots Action: Brainstorming Health Care
Join an exciting dialogue with passionate activists and experts who care deeply about health care to brainstorm grassroots activities. Come share creative ideas and make new friends!
Presenters: Liz Foley, Outreach Manager, Health Care Reform at Consumers Union and the rest of the Health Care Reform Organizing Team
Room: South Carolina

How to Use Blogs Effectively
With nearly 1,000,000 posts published every day, blogs have become an increasingly mainstream tool for sharing information and opinions with a wider audience. Learn the nuts and bolts of setting up your own blog, plus topic ideas, engaging your readers and simple rules of blog writing. Also, if you already have a blog how can you ensure that people will find it and keep returning? You’ll explore technical tools for building better interaction with readers, managing feedback, and promoting your blog to other bloggers to share and drive traffic.
Presenters: Bob Williams, blogger for Consumers Reports and Alex Chasick, Senior Fellow at Consumers Union (and former blogger at The Consumerist)
Room: Pennsylvania

Grassroots Action: Brainstorming Food and Product Safety
Join an exciting dialogue with passionate activists and experts who care deeply about food and product safety to brainstorm grassroots activities. Come share creative ideas and make new friends!
Presenters: Jean Halloran, Director, Food and Product Safety Campaign; Tim Marvin, Grassroots Organizer at Consumers Union and the rest of the Food and Product Safety team
Room: Virginia