The Backyard Activist: 21 Tips to Mobilize Your Community, Your Town, and Your World

by Mark Breier

The Backyard Activist is a book with tips to mobilize your community, your town, and your world. How do you take on arrogant city councils, tone-deaf school boards, and powerful corporations? How about poachers, illegal fisherman, and car thieves? Author Mark Breier is an investor, two-time author, and paid speaker who has won dozens of activist battles and shares his 21 tips. Mark's efforts have been profiled in the Wall Street Journal, Today Show, CNN, and on the Colbert Report. In recent times, many people have become more involved in politics, from a national to a local level. But most early activism is disorganized and fleeting; while street protesting is necessary and feels good - it does not affect long term change. There ARE a few simple, right things to do. The lessons in the Backyard Activist can work for any cause out there, and are the things Mark wished he had known when he first stood up for such causes. This information is as helpful as can be - from avoiding common pitfalls like speaking at endless city meetings to no avail, to the crucial how-to tactics like positioning yourself to the media as David vs Goliath. The Backyard Activist includes 21 chapters organized around the main tips I recommend for successful campaigns. Examples #2 Develop an Obviously Better Plan The most feared enemy of any existing plan is an Obviously Better Plan. I.e to beat the existing town hall design, we come up with an obviously better town hall "citizen's design" that was "half the height, half the cost, and more rural." All town design discussions then became, "do you favor the Council Design or the Citizen's Design" and, in a town-wide mailer that we sent out, 94% of citizens favored the Citizen's Design! #6 Identify Unifying Symbol for Your Campaign When the last of 4 elementary schools in the area closed, Los Altos Hills citizens put up cows everywhere and proclaimed they were being ‘milked’ by the school districts. #14 Introduce the 4 Community, Comedy, Competition, Cause Leatherback turtles, as big as your kitchen table, have been around for 100 million years. But they may have only 10 years left. On nesting beaches in Costa Rica, populations have crashed from 1500 nesting mothers to just 50. Poachers, illegal fishing, and long lines are the culprits. For 3 years, the Great Turtle Race offered fun competition to see which turtle would travel from Costa Rica to the Galapagos, and was picked up my several major news networks. #18 Tell your personal story in a blog (the media is always looking for stories) Mark blogged his frustration about high school sports taking over other aspects of life. A WSJ reporter was aware of the trend and came upon Mark’s blog while looking for content. She reached out for a WSJ print story, followed quickly by Today Show coverage. #20 Use a political cartoon to tell your story Your cause needs to break through the modern day chatter of TV/Radio/Internet/Text Message and quickly "What is your Cause? Why Should I Care? What do you want me to do?" A good picture for your cause can do this.

125 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 17, 2017