How do you want to make a difference?
Takoma Park Mobilization’s working groups are the spokes that carry the load of work it takes to mobilize our community. They are where activists like you find the satisfaction of doing something for other people, whether it’s:
- Neighbors from different communities sharing potluck
- Educators showing us how to facilitate consensus decision-making
- Writers and artists mobilizing us with words and images
- Activists slowing climate change
- Lobbying government officials
- Emptying the prisons that continue to fill in the aftermath of the so-called war on drugs or
- Saving Our Children from Gun Violence
Join the group where you feel you can do what you like to do and make a difference. Just click on any of the email addresses below.
Breaking Bread, community dinners: breakingbread@tpmobilization.org. More coming soon!
Communications/Outreach/Organizing/Logistics (COOL): COOL@tpmobilization.org. This Communications Group makes sure that all members of the Mobilization are informed about the activities of TPM’s various working groups and committees, through all forms of print and electronic media.
Whether you’re a writer who wants to help report on the Mobilization using emails or FaceBook posts, Twitter feeds, and the Mobilization’s website, or a technical specialist interested in playing with electronic media to exploit their communication potential, welcome to our newsroom.
We also include the Artists and Graphic Designer Subcommittee: art@tpmobilization.org. Guess what they do.
Education & Training Group: education@tpmobilization.org. The first goal of the Education & Training Group is to utilize the knowledge and skills of residents of Takoma Park to provide educational opportunities for TP Mobilization members and our community who are interested in local activism and progressive causes. The second is that the group will act as a resource and a model to support similar educational activities within and outside of TP Mobilization. A few more focused activities are part of this group:
- Subcommittee on Diversity, Inclusion, Bias and Anti-Racism Training
- Nonviolent Action Study Group
- TP Mobilization Book Group
Electoral/Constitutional Committee: electoral@tpmobilization.org. The electoral/constitutional working group is concerned with issues at the core of our democracy, such as redistricting, voter suppression, and the role of money in politics.
Environment Committee (TPMEC): environment@tpmobilization.org. TPMEC is full of dedicated people who work hard to make our environment safe and healthy, focusing especially on curbing climate change. We are energized by working together to give all of us the collective power to make our community and our planet safe for everyone.
We’re currently working with a coalition of groups called Maryland Leads on Climate, which is compelling Maryland political leaders to take dramatic action on climate change by making it a major issue in the 2018 state elections and beyond. In the past we turned Marylanders out for the People’s Climate March and helped the Maryland Sierra Club strengthen the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.
Immigration and Muslim Solidarity Committee: immigration@tpmobilization.org. The Immigration and Muslim Solidarity Committee works to support and partner with our immigrant and Muslim neighbors in a number of different ways. The group is currently composed of four subcommittees:
- Direct Support, which provides direct services (such as connections to lawyers, court accompaniment, fundraising, etc) to immigrants in our communities;
- Sanctuary Movement, which focuses on building a network of individuals, faith-based organizations, and other organizations to offer sanctuary to immigrants threatened with deportation;
- Muslim Solidarity, which works with our local Muslim community to counter Islamaphobia and educate others about Islamaphobia;
- Legislation, which works to lobby at the local, state, and national level in support of policies that protect immigrants, such as the Trust Act, the DREAM act, and more.
Indivisible: indivisible@tpmobilization.org. The Indivisible Working Group engages in the political process in ways that promote the progressive agenda of the Takoma Park Mobilization. We engage our community by creating or identifying opportunities for people to participate in the political process. This might involve volunteering in campaigns, organizing or participating in rallies, lobbying members of Congress and state lawmakers, and candidate forums. We work with other Indivisible groups nationwide, as well as other local partners, to resist the Trump agenda and accomplish a progressive agenda.
Mass Incarceration: incarceration@tpmobilization.org.
The Mass Incarceration Working Group works to stop the overabundant flow of mostly young black Americans into prisons. Its Restorative Justice subcommittee is working to end the school-to-prison pipeline in Montgomery County by helping ensure all students, especially students of color, LGBT and disabled students, are disciplined equally and less punitively, while the Bail Bond Reform subcommittee helps those of us who have no money to pay exorbitant bail, stay out of jail by helping us get the money. And our Expungement subcommittee helps those of us with criminal records have those records scrubbed clean, so that they can get hired, get credit, and leave that part of their past behind. Join us to keep our people out of prison and clear their records so they can move forward with their lives.
The Committee to Save Our Children’s Lives (SOCL): tpmobilization@gmail.com
Gun violence — in our schools, public spaces, and communities, perpetrated
by classmates, criminals, or the police — is killing us, but most importantly, our children.
Our new committee takes its direction from the potential victims of gun violence, through high-
school student groups, like MoCo4Gun Control, neighborhood organizations, and anti-racist collectives like Black Lives Matter.
We also partner with anti-racist White organizations and work with groups within TPM who share our vision and goal to end the senseless killing of innocents — White, Black, Brown, or Yellow.
In the run-up to the 2018 midterm elections, 32 of our members — most of them new to TPM — are registering young people to vote, for their lives.
For more information, please email tpmobilization@gmail.com.
Other issues we care about:
Economic Equity: economic@tpmobilization.org
Resources for activists
Former congressional staffers reveal best practices for making Congress listen
Open Sourcing Social Change: Inside the Constellation Model
Mijente: Expanding Sanctuary: What Makes a City a Sanctuary Now?
Local to Takoma Park:
CHEER 2017: Takoma Park and Long Branch Goals 2016