Associate Policy Director

CAUSE is a base-building organization committed to social, economic, and environmental justice for working-class and immigrant communities in California’s Central Coast. We build grassroots power through community organizing, leadership development, coalition building, civic engagement, policy research, and advocacy.

CAUSE is currently seeking an Associate Policy Director to fill a leadership role in public policy advocacy, multimedia communications, and staff supervision. The Associate Policy Director will supervise, train, and mentor a team of up to four Policy Advocates throughout the Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties region working on campaigns to advance affordable housing, farm worker rights, immigrant rights, and environmental justice.

CAUSE’s Policy Team supports our Organizing Team’s efforts to build a grassroots base of working-class immigrant community leaders in the Central Coast region by providing them with legislative analysis, coalition-building, messaging and graphic design. The Associate Policy Director will report to CAUSE’s Policy Director and will work closely with CAUSE’s Organizing Team to meet their policy and communications needs. This position is regional and can be based in any of CAUSE’s offices including Oxnard, Ventura, Santa Paula, Santa Barbara, Lompoc, or Santa Maria.

Interest in being located in CAUSE’s new Lompoc office is a plus.

• Directly supervising CAUSE’s up to 4 Policy Advocates, providing coaching, work planning, feedback, and accountability to their supervises and taking responsibility for their successful development and performance
• Training Policy Advocates in building coalitions, lobbying policymakers, conducting research, developing messaging, persuasive writing, digital and traditional media communications
• Coordinating with the CAUSE Organizing Team to meet their needs for policy and communications support for organizing campaigns and working collaboratively with CAUSE’s team of supervisors to ensure strong staff collaboration
• Planning, reviewing, and editing language, content, and graphic design of Policy Advocates’ public communications including flyers, newsletters, press releases, opinion editorials, talking points, surveys, petitions, social media posts, videos, webpages, mass emails, fact sheets, and infographics
• Acting as the City Team Lead for one of CAUSE’s six city-based chapters, coordinating the team’s strategic vision, serving as the senior staff member in the office, and maintaining CAUSE’s relationships and visibility within the community of that city
• Provide regular feedback and conduct annual staff evaluations, review and approve timesheets, PTO, and documentation/reporting
• Take a leadership role in regional and priority campaign strategy and direction, including building relationships with coalition partners, policymakers, and journalists
• Facilitating weekly city-based team meetings and creating space for strategizing and coordination between that city’s organizers and policy advocates
• Becoming familiar with a wide range of different policy issues and communities within the Central Coast region
• Representing the organization in regional and/or statewide coalitions
• Participating in some grassroots fundraising, grant writing and reporting

• Bachelor’s Degree or equivalent required, graduate degree in Public Policy, Urban Planning or related field a plus but not expected
• Fluency in Spanish strongly preferred
• 1+ year of supervision experience, can include temporary/part-time staff, interns
• 4+ years of experience in public policy advocacy and/or multimedia communications
• Strong writing and public speaking skills
• Eye for graphic design and visual media
• Knowledge of policy issues including housing, environment, labor, and immigration a plus
• Knowledge of Central Coast regional political landscape a plus
• Experience with and desire to work with diverse cultures and the ability to engage people from a variety of backgrounds
• Ability to interact professionally with elected officials, donors, board members, leaders of ally…