It's not too soon to begin building relationships with lawmakers who will hold office in 2003 and seeking their support of your issues. Nonprofit organizations that plan to get involved this election year can legally do so, as long as they follow the rules outlined by the Internal Revenue Service and Federal Election Commission. Your nonprofit organization can participate in nonpartisan voter and candidate education activities this fall to raise environmental awareness.

Issue advocacy and candidate briefings
Use the occasion of this year's election to increase exposure of your issues and build relationships with lawmakers. By visiting, calling and/or sending educational materials to candidates that address your issues of concern, you begin to build rapport with future decision makers. Nonprofits can legally try to persuade candidates to agree with their issues and encourage them to take a public stand (both now and once they reach office).

Endorsements
Nonprofit 501(c)(3) organizations cannot legally endorse any candidates. However, individuals working for a nonprofit can endorse, support or oppose candidates-as long as the individuals make it clear that they're doing it for themselves and not for their organization. Along these lines, employees (as individuals) can volunteer to help candidate campaigns or go speak with candidates when they're not wearing their "work hats."

Candidate appearances
An organization can invite candidates to speak or appear before its members, as long as the nonprofit invites all of the candidates to participate. Just make sure before any of the candidates speak-even if only one shows up-to tell your audience that all the candidates were invited and the candidates' appearance should not be viewed as an endorsement of any kind. No political fund raising should occur at your event.

Criticizing incumbents
If your nonprofit has a history of criticizing incumbents, lobbying them and working to hold them accountable, it can continue these activities during the election year. For example, if you've been pressuring legislators to adopt your views on certain legislation, and they vote against you, you may keep lobbying and calling public attention to how the incumbents voted, even during the election campaign. However, if you increase the level of criticism or devote additional resources to an incumbent's bad record-especially as you get closer to the election-the IRS could view negative comments as illegal "intervention" in the campaign.

Don't forget to mobilize your members to increase voter turnout this November-start sending those e-mail reminders and writing those newsletter articles now to get them out to vote for the issues they care about. Nonprofits can also operate a nonpartisan voter registration or get-out-the-vote drive, as long as it's designed to educate the public about the importance of voting and is not biased for a particular candidate or party.

For more information about nonprofit election-year advocacy, contact:
Alliance for Justice
(202) 822-6070 alliance@afj.org http://www.afj.org

League of Conservation Voters
Education Fund
(734) 327-7154 lisa_wozniak@lcvef.org http://www.lcvef.org