[OKC] We need more letters to the editor!

[Robert Waldrop]

One important method of participating in the public policy conversation is to write letters to the editor.  Below is my most recent letter published in the Oklahoman on June 19th.  

Nearly every letter I have sent the Oklahoman since I started getting "really involved" with sustainability issues has been published.  I'd like to share some of the basics of writing letters to the editor, because we need more such letters that promote the sustainability process.

These "guidelines" are oriented towards the Oklahoman, but they will probably work for most other newspapers.  Look for "guidelines for letters" on the website or the editorial page of the publication you are targeting for a letter.

1.  Keep it short.  The Oklahoman's drop dead length is 225 words.  If you send more than 225 words, an editor won't even see it.  But my experience is that sending less than 200 words is better.

2.  Make one point. When I draft a letter to the editor, typically my "first cut" tries to make about six gazillion points and is a page long. Well, not really, but often my first draft is about 500 words.  From there I whittle it down and typically end up with one, maybe 2 points to make. 

3.  Every word must move the letter forward to its conclusion.  Rhetoric like "in my opinion" is a waste of words, in this case 3.  In the context of a 200 word letter, three words is a LOT.  

4.  Reference the article you are responding to briefly by name and date. 

5.  Don't get mad when your letter is edited.  In the case of this letter, I originally sent 201 words, they published 131.  And the 70 or so words they eliminated were actually rhetorical fluff.  The column inches available for letters is a limited resource, so they don't publish rhetorical fluff.  

6.  There's a 2nd reason I don't mind their edits:  you can learn a lot about writing by comparing your original to their edited copy.  My letters nearly always disagree with e.g. local government policy and editorials in the Oklahoman.  Yet, they do get published, and yes, sometimes they are edited.  But I have learned much about newspaper writing by looking at their edits, and I didn't even have to pay tuition or attend a class.

7.  Don't delay -- if you see something you want to respond to, make time within 24 hours to send your letter.  News gets stale fast, and if you wait 2 weeks to respond to something in the Oklahoman, you probably won't get published.

8.  I send my letters by email, to yourviews at oklahoman.com .  Don't forget to include your name, address including zip, and phone number.  If you don't include that info, an editor won't see the email/letter.

9.  Don't bother with a salutation.  I simply put Letter to the Editor in the subject line, and then immediately start my letter in the body of the email.

10.  If you don't get an auto-response within 24 hours, your email got lost in cyberspace.

11.  Resist the urge to vent anger.  Indeed, some of the Oklahoman's edits of my most recent letter were catty comments I made about high gas prices putting a "crimp in the Big League City plan".  And yes, the most charitable thing I can say about those sentences were that they were catty.  I'm glad they were edited out.

12.  Always read your letter out loud.  If it sounds funny, then you need to keep on editing.  Edit until when read aloud it reads smoothly and intelligibly.

13.  Shorter sentences are better than longer sentences.

14.  Over time, don't hesitate to repeat yourself.  e.g., this sentence from my June 19th letter:

"Oklahoma City would then be a place where people could get to work, to shop and to entertainment, regardless of the price of gasoline."

in one form or another has appeared repeatedly in my letters over the last four years, in relation to protecting Union Station and increasing mass transit participation.  While I hit other subjects, this is my primary theme for my own little letter to the editor campaign. 

We need more letters.

For example, there is an editorial in today's Oklahoman that I would dearly love to reply to, but since I had a letter published on the 19th, they won't consider another letter from me for 4 to 6 weeks.  It's the editorial "Bad News Bearers" which uses government figures for inflation and unemployment to "prove" things are better than most people's rhetoric suggests.  Those inflation and unemployment statistics of course are about as respectable as the reports from the old Soviet Union of the successful completion of the latest Five Year Plan, which were reported regularly in the Soviet media right up until the day the old Soviet Union collapsed and Yeltsin used the term "former Soviet Union" for the first time in public.  If you had read only the Soviet newspapers, you would never have known anything was going on.

WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT RIGHT NOW

There is a lot of ferment among "the people" right now.

We are edging towards a situation where a critical mass may start coming together in favor of rapid and serious changes that would be very good.

But the situation could easily go the other way too.  Lots of dark voices are very loud out there, preaching xenophobia, war, violence, and class warfare.  If we the "sustainablistas" don't enter the public square en masse, someone else will be there.  And we may not like what people decide to choose as a result.

I have said for a long time, that one of these days people are going to wake up across the board, and when that happens, we better be there the firstest with the mostest.  When that happened in Weimar Germany, the Nazis got there the firstest with the mostest and look what happened thereafter.

Just as only one straw can break the camel's back, or one grain of sugar crystalize a super-saturated solution, one 150 word letter to the editor could set off a critical mass in favor of sustainable solutions.  The letter you don't write may be that lost opportunity.  

Estimated time commitment:  2-3 hours, every 4-6 weeks, if you aim to get published on their minimum time frame.  

This is a high potential value/low entry barrier sustainability activity.

Bob Waldrop, OKC

Not an option
Regarding "Off track: Crosstown foes revel in slowing progress" (Our Views, June 12): CNN has identified Oklahoma City as the worst major city in the United States to "ride out" an oil crisis. For most of us, saving money by taking the bus or train isn't an option because there are no buses or trains to take us from where we live to where we work and shop. Union Station's facilities could be the center of a functional, cost-effective, multimodal transportation system. Oklahoma City would then be a place where people could get to work, to shop and to entertainment, regardless of the price of gasoline. By the time the Interstate 40 relocation boondoggle is finished, gasoline will be $8 a gallon or more. 
Bob Waldrop, Oklahoma City
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