Transform Transportation Advocate

U.S. PIRG is hiring a Transportation Advocate for our national Transform Transportation Program. We’re looking for an experienced political advocate who will be responsible for media outreach, organizing, developing staff, influencing stakeholders, coalition-building, and fundraising.

U.S. policies have long favored automobiles over other forms of travel. As a result, Americans are overly dependent on driving — contributing to pollution, congestion, poor mental and physical health, and crushing financial burdens for American households. Instead, we need to convince our leaders to stop building unnecessary highways and to provide better opportunities to travel by rail, bus, bicycle and walking.

We're hiring a Transportation Advocate to help lead our national and Massachusetts state transportation campaigns to advocate for better public transit, biking and walking infrastructure, repairing the roads we already have, and to advocate against spending so many public dollars on unnecessary highway expansion. Americans want more transportation choices. Our challenge is to convince our public leaders to listen to the public and adopt solutions that make sense for the long term. If you want to work hard, challenge yourself, and make an actual impact on some of the most critical issues of our time, apply for a career with U.S. PIRG.

Responsibilities

• Program Development: Help develop programs and campaigns, including researching the issue, creating viable policy solutions, and proposing the right political strategy and messaging.
• Advocacy: Make the best case for our policies directly to decision-makers. Build relationships with players in regulatory agencies, the statehouse, or in Congress.
• Campaign Strategy: Work with the Program Director to develop plans to win on our campaigns; assess opportunities for building political support through grassroots organizing, media coverage, endorsements and message development.
• Coalition Building: Meet with other groups who are concerned about this issue. Share strategies and allocate resources in order to maximize our influence.
• Fundraising: Write grant proposals, build relationships with foundation staff, and meet with major donors. Work with our citizen outreach staff to build and develop our membership base.
• Media Outreach: Serve as the spokesperson for our campaigns through media events, press releases and opinion writing. Keep abreast of important transportation issues, raise the profile of transportation issues in the media.
• Staff Recruitment and Development: Recruit new staff and volunteers. Oversee program staff to develop and implement work plans, provide training and leadership development opportunities.

Qualifications

Candidates must have at least 3 years of relevant professional experience, excellent judgement and discretion, and the ability to oversee significant projects. Qualified candidates will have a demonstrated commitment to public interest or consumer issues and to citizen-based social change, as well as a track record of leadership. We're looking for people who are goal-driven and results-oriented, who have excellent verbal, written and analytical skills, the ability to speak persuasively in a charged atmosphere, and driven to make positive policy change.