Attendee 'Day on The Hill' Guide Letter

March 1, 2018

To 2018 Advocacy Summit & Day on The Hill Attendees:

As we head into April, I wanted to touch base with everyone about scheduling your Capitol Hill meetings for Rail Passengers Association’s April 17th ‘Day on the Hill’.

If you haven’t already initiated the process of scheduling your Congressional meetings, we would encourage you to begin contacting your elected official's D.C. offices as soon as possible. If needed, you can search for and connect with your member’s offices via these links - House or Senate

Many of you are ahead of the curve on this and have been reporting your scheduled meetings to the D.C. office. Special thanks to the Division Leaders, who will be playing a key role in coordinating this work.

Once you have scheduled your appointments, please fill out and submit this form with your appointment information (a separate form submission form for each scheduled meeting please).

We have compiled all of the scheduled meetings which have been submitted into a Day on The Hill Master Schedule spreadsheet. This link will open a Excel Spreadsheet with the current apointments the Rail Passengers Association office has been informed of. You can view this list , but not edit it. Please notify Bruce Becker if changes, additions or revisions are needed.

This link will take you to an online list of all currently registered attendees that will be helpful for those looking to organize their meetings by state and regional delegations. This is especially important for the Senate, as we don't want 'Day on The Hill' participants scheduling multiple meetings with the same senator.

The Rail Passengers Association staff is strongly encouraging everyone to schedule their own meetings! This will help you create a more durable impression on congressional staffers, since you won’t be communicating with them for the first time on April 17th. It will also free up Rail Passengers Association staff resources to respond to requests for information and organizing support from our Congressional rail allies on the Hill. Also, we will be following the White House’s budget proposal to eliminate long distance trains and several key transit capital investment programs. These requests have been considerable!

To help guide you in the scheduling process, we’ve posted “A Beginner’s Guide to Rail Passengers Association Day on the Hill” by Board Director Thomas Girsch of Massachusetts. It describes the process from a volunteer’s perspective, provides a sample scheduling request letter and offers several helpful tips and insights.

If you feel you are unable to schedule meetings on your own, the Rail Passengers Association staff will be able to assist you. Please reach out to us at: Sean Jeans-Gail - [email protected]; Samantha Brown – [email protected] or Alicia Guinn - [email protected] if you need help.

Thank you in advance for all your hard work. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out.

Sean Jeans-Gail | Vice President - Government Affairs & Policy

Rail Passengers Association