Inspiring Leadership in Immigrant Communities - ILRC

Inspiring Leadership in Immigrant CommunitiesJanuary 2003you have sufficient space to hold it? Do you have the personnel resources to write a pressrelease, distribute it, call press contacts and do any necessary follow-up work?Important note: It is almost always more effective if someone from the community who isdirectly impacted by the issue speaks at the press conference rather than a service provider orsomeone not directly affected by the issue.ExampleAn agency is going to conduct a press conference protesting new regulations the INS isgoing to implement. The new regulations would make it harder for low-income farmworkers to immigrate their children and spouses because the sponsor has to prove anincome level higher than any farm worker actually makes. In such a press conference itwould be crucial to allow farm workers to tell their stories.Decide whether the press conference should include representatives from media that speaklanguages besides English. If so, you need to decide whether to do the press conference inEnglish and the other language, whether to have separate conferences, and who will translate ifthe person is scheduled to speak does not speak English.Lecture: Putting on A press conferenceA. Deciding the timing and location of the press conference (5 minutes)Timing: It is useful to hold the press conference at a time when something significant ishappening related to your issue—it’s called a “hook” because you can catch a reporter’sattention with it.Lead a brief discussion about what the leaders think makes a good hook generally, andwhat might be a good hook for the issue they are working on now. The followingnaturalization-related examples contain some useful considerations:• local angle• noteworthy date• related issues in the news• large numbers of people affected• strong human interest• controversial issue• government publicizing related programExample 1During 1994-97 hundreds of thousands of people became eligible fornaturalization because it had been five years since they became lawful permanentresidents (LPRs) through amnesty; many people wanted to naturalize so theycould vote to counter the anti-immigrant sentiment of that time; the INS’s GreenCard Replacement Program required hundreds of thousands of LPRs to apply for6-4