How to Write Commissioners, Political Candidates, and Elected Officials

For anyone who may not have written their Commissioners or other public officials about their concerns in the past, the following are some brief suggestions:
(see important notes on emailing below)

The letters are best kept brief. In the first few sentences or paragraph, identify yourself, where you live, and your connection with the community (when you came to the community, how long you have lived there, etc.). In the second few sentences or paragraph, briefly say how important it is to you that the Commissioners (or whoever you are writing) support ONE SPECIFIC ISSUE that you are writing about.

You don't have to go into great detail (though you can, if you wish) about the particular issue about which you are expressing concern. The most important thing is for your public officials to hear from MANY individuals about the issue, and that what you say is not just presented in an obviously regurgitated formula. For example, if you are writing asking the Commissioners to support the use of the Williams Aviation Study as the basis for trying to change flight paths to reduce disturbing airport noise, you can also mention how much such noise bothers you in your own home and neighborhood and how crazy it seems to you that flight paths are not being modified when they COULD be modified to reduce the impact of such noise on homeowners. Public officials assume that for every message they receive on a topic, there may be dozens of others who feel the same way, but haven't written to them. Thus even your brief note of several sentences is significant.

You don't have to be an "expert" on the subject or argue a point in depth for it to have an impact. Just the fact that the public officials (or would-be public officials) are hearing from large numbers of people on a particular issue is significant in causing them to pay attention, especially just before an election.

If you want to write about more than one issue, use two or more separate letters, rather than discussing a laundry list of issues in a single letter. Your message is diluted if there are too many things you are asking the Commissioners (or other public officials) to do in a single letter.

Public officials also like to have a SPECIFIC ACTION REQUEST (for example, support exploring the flight path modifications mentioned in the Williams Aviation study), rather than just sweeping complaints about how much airport noise bothers you.

Emailing DeKalb County Commissioners:
Do not attempt to email more than one county commissioner at a time. The DeKalb County Commissioners office has spam filters that will not allow an individual email to go to more than one commissioner at a time. Please send your emails separately to the seven commissioners. List of elected officials and contact information