Replies From My Elected Officials
Ziggi | Apr 05, 2010 | Comments 3
I’m feeling really good today. Just how a constituent should feel after contacting six of their elected officials.
Oh, I’m going to drop the “elected officials” thing and just call these folks “honorables” since by default or by popular consent the title has been bestowed.
I recently contacted six of my honorables regarding an assortment of past and pending political issues. This was done over a period of two weeks or so. And I feel good like a constituent should!
This euphoric feeling comes from the fact that they all responded. Yep, without exception all of the honorables got back to me. Not only did they get back to me but their response was exactly what I anticipated. That’s why I’m so pleased. Here is one response that pretty much clones them all:
Thank you very much for your email. It is important to me that I hear from constituents on issues that matter most to them and I appreciate you taking the time to contact me. My Constituent Services staff and I will review your correspondence and respond to you as soon as possible.
Oddly enough there is a commitment in these responses. That is – “My Constituent Services staff and I will review your correspondence and respond to you as soon as possible.” That has not happened yet. Granted, it’s only been two weeks and the honorables have been very busy of late in-fighting and out-fighting on a number of issues.
Yet, I’m still pleased over getting the predicted responses. If nothing else it shows consistency, and that’s something we all want in government. True, some mildly personalized response would have made me even happier but I have come to realize that you can’t have it all. So a small piece will do for now.
I do have some thoughts though on how the honorables could greatly improve on this.
- Create a randomizer for responding to email inquiries that chooses a random canned response. Two examples of pre-loaded emails that might be sent- “Hey, great idea, I’m going to get my staff on this right away”. Or, “Hey, bad idea, we tried that one before and got our A’s kicked”. This would make half of the constituents happy at any given time. That’s much higher ratings than recent polls show and most constituents would certainly appreciate the more humanized response.
- Respond with something that makes it appear that the email was read. You know, similar to the gratuitous stuff used by comment spammers- “Hey, you seem to have done your homework on this issue. Please send more of your thoughts on this. I think you have really hit on something here! Can’t wait to read more from you!
- Don’t respond at all.
- Respond with something real. Even if it is canned! As long as it is based on fact and located somewhere in the realm of reality.
Meanwhile back in my own world, there are a number of pleasing alternatives for me to consider. Highest amongst them is the one related to choice. When it comes to flipping the old ballot lever maybe I’ll flip the one that represents the honorable who was the most responsive to my inquiries and requests. Just maybe, this will be the perfect time for me to measure-up the honorables and honorable wannabes based on my own rating of commitment, responsiveness, and honest concern for us grassrooters.
Speaking of grassroots- If you want to try alternative methods of getting your issue, advice, complaints, thoughts, rantings or ravings out into the world, go and check out Spinal Cord Advocates. You don’t have to have a spinal cord injury to play here. Any disability or just an interest in issues that impact on people with disabilities will work well. You can heap on the praise or scorn or just field your thoughts and concerns to the gang in the trenches.
Filed Under: General • Praise and Scorn
I agree…. those canned responses are very frustrating and if you are already unhappy with the elected official – it gives you more cause to be more unhappy…. I would encourage people to find specific staff addresses in elected leaders offices and email those people directly – that is the best way to get a response. I think most e-mail correspondence with a general e-mail address gets lost in cyberspace to never be found again…..
Two thoughts….
1. I think the frustration mostly comes not from the auto-response (at least we know the email was received) but from the follow up response, or lack thereof.
2. Personally, I DO have a bit of that ‘good feeling’ when remitting a well-considered email to one of my Representatives. I do that just often enough to appreciate the thoughts expressed above. I guess I need to be pretty satisfied with my own Representatives (the honorables) as the responses I have received from them were fairly timely AND customized to the inquiry I made. Now, anyone could see that these responses were only slightly customized from a pre-prepared template to expedite those responses to constituents but I’d expect that, even respect it as it is obviously in place as a time saving mechanism.
Further, I’ve been in the home office of one of my own State Representatives on several occasions to see first-hand how that staff responds to constituents inquiries and I have to say I was very impressed with their attention and responsiveness.
Now, I DO agree that looking up the office contact info and making more direct contact would be more effective and likely elicit a more timely and considered response in most cases. Get to know the staff and make sure they know you!
As Manager of Spinal Cord Central I can also relay that we receive periodic inquiries from legislative offices on behalf of some of their constituents facing local dilemmas when dealing with the aftermath of spinal cord injury or disease. And again, I have to credit those staff members for locating and reaching out to SCC and NSCIA while seeking answers for their constituents. Even more responsiveness from ALL legislative offices would certainly be better though.
Bill
I wrote my Congressman, the Honorable Peter King,(R)NY, about healthcare reform. He referes to the reform legislation as “Obamacare” and was a staunch opponent. I told him about all the people with disabilities who remain dependent on government or go uninsured because of preexisting condition exclusions,limitations and waiting periods; about lifetime and annual benefit caps that have the effect of limiting or denying care and about our company’s health insurance buying nightmare. This year our insurer asked for a 30% increase – we shopped and changed carriers and still had to deal with a 21% increase in costs, and this after a decade of annual increases of 10% or more. I asked him his solution to both the problems of people with disabilities who having difficulty obtaining medical insurance and runaway costs. I have yet to hear from him.