2012 AAD: What to Expect at the Statehouse

ARTS ADVOCACY DAY: February 7th, 2012

• You can expect to meet up with arts supporters like yourself from all over the state – arts administrators, board members, volunteers, educators, students, artists and parents.
• Advocates will gather in the Statehouse first floor lobby area by 11:30 AM (enter from the Sumter Street side) to greet legislators as they arrive for the noon session. You will need to pass through security at that entrance. Depending on the weather and the size of the crowd, you may see a group gathered in front of the Statehouse on Main Street or outside the entrance on the Sumter side.
• Arts Advocates will be easy to spot. The Arts Alliance will provide our lightweight plastic white “hard hats” and our signature advocacy button – “ART WORKS IN SOUTH CAROLINA” with Mona Lisa also wearing her hard hat. (If you still have your hat and button from last year – please wear them as they are now limited in number!)
• You are also encouraged to bring your own signage but please be respectful and civil – “no bashing”.
• As legislators and staff arrive – entering from the basement’s parking garage into the Statehouse for the day’s session — advocates will form a “gauntlet” and greet them by passing out our advocacy buttons and hats asking for their support to continue funding of the arts and arts education. We also plan to distribute business-size cards that state our message.
• If you see your legislator, remind him or her of the day’s Legislative Appreciation Luncheon and if you will be in attendance. Plan to take a photo of you and your Legislator with your camera phone and add it to your Facebook page or our’s at: www.facebook.com/scartsalliance.
  Some advocates will have already met with their legislators earlier in the morning (by making an appointment in advance or just stopping by their office for a brief visit and leaving information). You might like to do the same.
• If you missed seeing your legislator, there will be “call out” forms you can fill out and have delivered to your legislator to let them know you are in the lobby or gallery. You can also use the forms at the desks in front of each chamber.
• You can expect that both the first floor and the second floor lobby areas will be congested with many other citizens and groups advocating for their own issues, along with legislators and lobbyists. That’s a good thing! Mix and mingle.
• Once legislators arrive and move to the House or Senate chambers for the day’s opening session, you may want to view floor activities from their respective galleries on the second floor. It’s a real education!
• The galleries are small in capacity, especially the Senate gallery. You will be ushered in as seats become available. Because the chamber galleries are popular and always crowded, seating may be limited. You are encouraged not to linger too long in the galleries in order for others to be seated. You may be asked to remove your “hard hat”, but be sure to put it back on in the lobby area.
• South Carolina’s Arts Advocacy Day will be announced from the “floor” of each chamber, and Arts Advocates should stand and be recognized.
• If you have a reservation for the Legislative Appreciation Luncheon, you will want to leave the Statehouse no later than 12:45 PM in order to arrive and check in on time. The Luncheon takes place across the street from the Statehouse at the Capital City Club, 25th floor of the Capital Center Building at 1201 Main Street, 1:00 – 2:30 PM. There is a parking garage in the building.
• You must register for the luncheon in advance and the cost is $35. However, please consider being an UNDERWRITER of the event, and take advantage of the “Special Advocate’s Deal” — $60 will cover a legislator’s lunch and your own! You can underwrite additional legislator lunches at $30 each.
• Even though all legislators will have received an invitation to the Legislative Appreciation Luncheon from the Arts Alliance and the event is on their official House and Senate calendars, contact your legislator to remind them of the Luncheon and that you will be in attendance. Legislators will arrive at the Luncheon following “adjournment”.
• If you can’t stay for the Luncheon, but still want to help make an impression on our policymakers, just join us at the Statehouse first floor lobby area at 11:30 AM. You will help to increase our numbers – putting a face on the arts – as the legislators arrive, and you’ll be back to work or class in no time!