The White House has announced a new way for citizens to petition the federal government to take action, through the “We the People” initiative. This is a really cool citizen engagement initiative coming out of the White House. Individuals will be able to either create or sign a petition and if they can get 5,00 signatures in 30 days, it will be reviewed by a group of White House staff and directed to the appropriate Federal agencies for an official on-the-record response. The White House announcement about the initiative highlights more interesting components of the program:
There’s another aspect to this meant to emphasize the grassroots, word of mouth organizing that thrives on the internet. At first, a petition’s unique URL will only be known to its creator and will not show up anywhere else on WhiteHouse.gov. It’s up to that person to share it in their network to gather an initial amount of signatures — initially 150 — before it is searchable on WhiteHouse.gov.
Take a look at the resources below that will walk you through how the program works. It will be interesting to follow up with the program and see some results once the White House officially launches the initiative.
Is this an initiative you would consider taking part in? In what ways is this an improvement from our traditional petition process?