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Last month I posted about the declining influence of “old media” and the challenges it creates for organizers.

I didn’t expect one month later to hear that our local paper, the Ann Arbor News, is closing, to be replaced with AnnArbor.com

After the news I was talking to the education director at the University of Michigan Exhibit Museum of Natural History, Kira Berman, who told me that one of her key outreach strategies of public events is to get them listed in the paper.

So much for that.

Now, what do we do?

The easy answer is that we need to incorporate new technologies into our outreach strategies.

But it’s not that easy.

The new media do not have the same following that the old, mass media did. In a world of 3 TV networks, each of them had a lot of influence. In a world of 100 TV channels + netflix + insane numbers of YouTube videos + blogs + everything else, nothing has the same influence that the old systems had.

This means 2 thigns:

1. You don’t need to work as hard to get a somebody to carry your story.
2. You have to work harder because you need more somebodies to carry your story.

I still have to think about how we get those more somebodies. Stay tuned.

We’re up to $570 raised for my birthday challenge. That’s enough to get me to recite the Lorax on Main Street, but so far the most votes go for a shaved head.

The idea of a peace fairy running the Dexter-Ann Arbor Run is getting a lot of buzz, but we’re $430 away from that. Will we make it?

We’re still on for my Birthday Challenge, where my friends, neighbors, and co-workers get to pay to see me make a fool of myself in public all to support the Interfaith Council for Peace and Justice.

So after getting some feedback about how I should embarrass myself for the birthday challenge.

Now, here’s the list:

• 

  $250 and my noggin could look like this

  If we raise $250, I’ll shave my head. “Bic it” as they say. I’ll end up looking something like Seth Godin.  OR I’ll provide all donors with a jar of preserves, a loaf of homemade bread, or a bottle of homebrew (out of towners will have to kick in for shipping).

• If we raise $500, I’ll recite The Lorax on a soap box on Main Street wearing a Cat in the Hat hat. It would be a nice Earth Day event (yes video will be taken.
• If we raise $750, I’ll make my own version of the Lazy Sunday music video. Choose this one at your own risk, I’m not that musically talented.
• 

  Yes, for $1000 raised for ICPJ I would dress up like this...in public.

  If we raise $1,000, I’ll Run the Dexter Ann Arbor run in fairy wings with a tiara and a wand. It might look something like this, only for real, not for incompetently photoshopped;

• and the grand prize, if we raise $2,500 I will wear a similar pink fairy costume all day, including to a board meeting, walking around campus, and downtown for dinner out.

Donations are accepted from now until March 31 either through Network for Good or through the Facebook Causes application. Every $50 get you 1 vote ($5-$50 is 1 vote, $51-$100 is 2, etc). If you’re not into online giving, you can mail donations to ICPJ, 730 Tappan, Ann Arbor, MI 48104. Make checks out to “ICPJ” and put “Chuck’s Challenge” in the subject line.

I want to point out that we can overshoot a goal and still go back to an earlier “prize.” So if you really want to hear the Lorax, but we raise $1,000, people can still vote to hear me recite. And remember, if that’s what you want, the more you donate the more you get to vote.

Finally, if any great ideas come up for other “prizes,” we can add them to the list. Voting will begin after the challenge finishes up.

I'm willing to make a fool of myself for a good cause. What type of public humiation should I do? How much is it worth to you?

So I was inspired by the Beth’s Blog stories about people publicly humiliating themselves for good causes. So I figured, “hey, my birthday is coming up, maybe I should make a fool of myself and raise some cash for the Interfaith Council for Peace and Justice.”

So here’s the plan: I’m taking suggestions for what I should offer as a prize for reaching our fundraising goal.

Here are my initial thoughts:

• Every donor gets either a bottle of homebrew birthday beer, a loaf of bread, or a can of preserves (okay, it’s not embarrassing, but it is tasty);
• Make my own version of the Lazy Sunday music video;
• Shave my head;
• Recite The Lorax on a soap box on Main Street for Earth Day while wearing a Cat in the Hat hat;
• Run the Dexter Ann Arbor run in fairy wings with a tiara and a wand;

So these are my ideas, but somehow I figure you have other ideas for what I could do. Offer them up in the comments, and on Tuesday, March 17 I’ll come up with the humiliation list.

Now for the fine print:

• I reserve the right to disqualify actions (sorry, no public nudity);
• Not every act of public humiliation is worth the same amount of money. For example, I’d shave my head for $250, but the tiara would take at least $1,000;
• Donations accepted until March 31, 2009;
• Everyone who donates gets to vote on what I do.  ($5 to $49 donors get 1 vote; $50 to $99 donors get 2 votes, $100 to $249 get get 4 votes; each $250 donation gets you 8 votes) Every $50 get you 1 vote ($5-$50 is 1 vote, $51-$100 is 2, etc);
  
• I can donate and vote too, so I might choose to put something really out there as one of the options and then start a bidding war over whether or not I actually have to go through with it.

You don’t have to wait until we pick the humiations, you can start donating now. If you’re not into online giving, you can mail donations to ICPJ, 730 Tappan, Ann Arbor, MI 48104. Make checks out to “ICPJ” and put “Chuck’s Challenge” in the subject line.

Here’s a line from the Just Enough Planning Guide

There’s a saying that a camel is a horse designed by a committee. This seems like a particularly hard knock against the camel, but the point is well made. As you expand the number of people involved in planning, you run the risk of creating internal inconsistencies and unnecessary complexity, and, worst of all, you could lose sight of your campaign objectives. The key is to keep it tight and keep it small, but empower those on your team to do the work and trust that they will.

They identify 4 common roles for people to be part of the process: Input Givers, Decision Makers, Hard Truth Squad, and Buy-In Givers.

This is a useful framework. When thinking who you need to have on board, also consider how you need them on board and what role they need to play.

Some people have been absolutely wiped out by the recent economic turmoil.

Most of us, though, still have our jobs. So while we may be scared, we’re doing okay for now.

What should we be doing?

Here are seven ways you can take care of your community and take care of your own finances.

1. Buy local: Now is not the time to save $1.78 on a book by shopping on Amazon. Amazon doesn’t employ your neighbor, donate to your local school, host a local book group, or order takeout from your favorite Indian restaurant. Really push yourself to see how local you can go. Do you buy the coffee roasted across the country or the coffee roasted by the local coffee guy?

I know this might cost a little bit more at times, but right now your community needs you more than you need the 37 cents you might save on a light switch by buying it from Home Depot.

Don’t stop with being a locavore-be a locaholic.

2. Give generously: In my family we are increasing our charitable giving now, especially to groups that care for the poor. Many people who used to donate for these charities are now going to them for help. That means they have more demand and they have fewer contributors.

We are continuing our support of other nonprofits as well. We love our local NPR stations, and we want to keep them on the air.

Finally, charity is important now, but don’t forget justice. Caring for the people hurting in this recession is important, and we also need to address the causes of poverty and the structures that were leaving people behind even before the recession. That means supporting groups that are advocating for policy changes to provide for the common good.

3. Cultivate simple tastes: Yes, fine wines and fancy cheeses are delightful, but so is a simple grilled cheese sandwich. It’s even better if you make it with local cheese and fresh bread from a real neighborhood bakery. You don’t have to spend a lot of money to find things to delight you.

4. Learn to cook (and especially how to cook beans): When you cook from scratch you save money. At eighty cents a pound for local, organic dry black beans, simple foods like this are a tremendous value. They taste better, too.

5. Food not Lawns: It’s amazing. You put a few seeds in the soil, give them some water and some care, and they turn into food. All for free! And you don’t have to mow it! We still have a lawn, but our garden is taking up more and more of it.

6. Love your library. Checking out books and movies from the library is a lot cheaper than Netflix and Nicola’s Books, and that’s even after factoring in my occasional late fees. Check out your local museum, or catch a music show at a local coffee shop or bar. There are plenty of ways you can enjoy yourself that are free or very cheap.

7. Buy used. Consignment store clothing, thrift store dishes, and Craigslist appliances are all great ways to save a bit of coin. It can be fun to see the crazy stuff at the thrift stores, it sure beats the predictability of the big box stores. And a lot of what’s for sale is practically new. Compulsive shoppers, shirts that were the wrong size, and people who would rather donate than pack when they move keep the thrift stores stocked with good-quality merchandise.

Of course, all the standard financial advice still holds. Eliminate credit card debt. Keep an emergency reserve fund. Live within your means.

We are facing some tough times ahead. Getting through them will demand more from us: more money for charity, more time to learn how to save money, and more discipline to keep our financial houses in order.  We can get through this if we show the commitment to care for ourselves and the compassion to care for our community.

When you organize an event, you are fully immersed in it. You know what you expect to happen. You know why it’s structured the way it is.

You know what is going on.

Your audience, however, does not.

That’s why your job as an event organizer is to let people know what to expect.

• Let people know when they can ask questions and when they can offer their thoughts.
• Let people know know when they will eat and how that will work.
• Let people know where the bathrooms are.

Not only will this help put people at ease, it will also make your event run more smoothly.

One of the challenges I have every day at work is separating myself from the urgent tasks to make time for the important ones.

It’s so easy to get burried by the next event or the next newsletter to not have time to set up a face-to-face meeting with a potential community partner or to call a major donor to let her know how her support is making a difference.

The same thing happens in work-life balance.

Last week I went from Saturday to Thursday without having an evening at home with my wife. I had work engagements Saturday-Wendesday, and she had one Thursday.

All of these engagements were pressing, even urgent, but my marriage means more to me.

It’s just hard to make time for it sometimes, and that’s an even worse mistake than not making time for fundraising.

Make time for what is important.

As the organization where I work prepared to start a program on faith-based action to stop climate change, I prepped by listening to podcasts from the Creation Care for Pastors website.

I heard some great preaching and some excellent Bible study that showed how care for God’s earth is a religious mandate.

What left me unsatisfied is where that stopped.

The sermons I listened to did an amazing job of explaining why we should care for the earth. And to explain how to do this, they talked about filling your tires to improve gas mileage and setting up recycling progams at churches.

That’s a good start, but I’m sorry, that’s not enough.

If you look at the Bible, the Hebrew scriptures include laws about environmental protection.

A great example is the law of the sabbath year. This law said that every seven years the earth was given a year of rest, just like every seven days people were to get a day of rest. This law teaches us to respect the earth and to take care of it’s ability to give forth food rather than stripping all nutrients out of the soil in a greedy effort to get more and more productivity from the land.

Environmental protection was the law.

And as we face the environmental challenge of today, we need more than inflated tires and recycling progams, we need good lawys.

The Cuyahoga River in Ohio used to catch fire. Now it doesn’t. The credit doesn’t go to individuals who stopped dumping. The credit goes to solid envrionmental regulations that cleaned up the river.

In discussing global warming, Thomas Friedman says, “change your leaders, not your lightbulbs.” His point is that the challenges we face are much larger than we can fix by only driving a Prius or eating local greens.

These are important, but to get the change we need, we need strong environmental laws.

Personal and community transforamation are important. The sermons on Creation Care for Pastors give a good baseline. But to really fix the problem we need policy change.

Lucky for the folks at CCFP, the Bible gives us a good model of just that.

I have a dear friend who is a community organizer for Planned Parenthood. How did she get her start?

When she was a college student, the Genocide Awareness Project came to campus. This is a group that tries to build opposition to abortion by comparing abortion to genocides such as the Holocaust and the Rawandan Genocide.

With my friend, this tactic backfired.

She had always been pro-choice, but the hyperbole of the Genocide Awareness Project’s claims spurred her to action. She called up a pro-choice group and they sent someone to train her as a campus organizer.

Soon she was organizing bus trips to the March for Womens Lives, and now she’s a full-time paid organizer for Planned Parenthood.

I don’t think that’s what the Genocide Awareness Project meant to do.

There are plenty of cases like this of earnest people hurting their cause:

• The hard-core McCain supporters that talked about killing Obama turned off moderates from McCain’s campaign;
• Some anti-drug messages actually lead to an increase in drug use (source);
• The anti-abortion guy who told me “Obama is almost as bad as Hitler” because of his support for a woman’s right to choose convinced me to volunteer with Planned Parenthood’s get-out-the-vote campaign.

Of course sometime you need to take strong stands that do mobilize your opposition as well as your base. That’s part of engaging in contentious issues.

What you also need to do is really think carefully about who your audience is and how they understand the world. If you are trying to convince a moderate swing voter that Obama is dangerous for America, then talking about killing Obama won’t work.

If you’re trying to convince a peer-conscience high school student not to try pot, then you don’t want your marketing campaign to give her the message that all her friends are doing it.

Think through you message and tactics, not just from your point of view of someone who is already conviced, but from the point of view of the people you are trying to convince.