CALPIRG interns and volunteers have engaged thousands of students here at Cal this semester, from asking students to sign petitions to ban plastic bags, collecting donations for famine relief in Somalia, student pledges to reduce energy overuse, signatures to urge Congress to cut wasteful subsidies to big agribusiness or pledges to support us by adding $10 per semester to their CARS account. These actions may seem unrelated, but in fact what ties them together is CALPIRG’s mission to fight for the public first against powerful and wealthy special interest groups.

CALPIRG’s tireless effort to ban plastic bags in Berkeley stands in contrast to the over $2 million spent in just two weeks by the American Chemistry Council to lobby Sacramento to allow plastic to continue to pollute our environment. CALPIRG’s petitions to Congress rival big agribusinesses like Cargill that receive millions of dollars in federal subsidies, and their individual pledges by students to support them with a $10 fee every semester give us a chance to stand up against billions of corporate dollars influencing our political system.

Students at the University of Oregon started the first campus PIRG chapter in 1971 because “we have more problems than we deserve and more solutions than we use.” They wanted to play a bigger role shaping our society. They recognized that the average student in college is not equipped with enough time, resources or skills to launch a successful political campaign yet. And while college students are some of the most idealistic and talented members of society, the campus community is always changing, with most students leaving within 5 years.

Students here at Berkeley started CALPIRG to provide institutional knowledge, training and professional expertise to make students’ work more effective. Students voted every few years to assess themselves a fee to fund this work and hire full time staff. The hard work of the group’s staff — the organizers who empower students with the skills to run their own campaign, the researchers who track legislation and issues to better inform the public and the advocates who bring the student voice to halls of power — amplify the effects of student organizing. And it shows in their results.

But powerful special interests saw the work of students as a threat and took away students’ right to fund an organization in this way in California, forcing CALPIRG to switch to a pledge system of funding.

Here at Berkeley, the pledge system requires 15 percent of the student body to individually pledge to pay $10 every semester in order to keep CALPIRG on campus. CALPIRG has successfully gathered the support of 30,000 students around the state every year for the last 20 years.

Ideally, students would be able to vote for a CALPIRG fee to fund this organization, which benefits the whole campus community. Imagine what kind of social change could be made if every student — not just those who happen to get canvassed — could fund CALPIRG.

However, even with limited resources, CALPIRG has won some impressive victories. For example, CALPIRG’s higher education advocate, Rich Williams, worked closely with the White House to pass the 2009 Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act. This act reformed the student loan system limiting predatory lending practices of big banks, taking $60 billion in free government handouts away from big banks and instead giving it to students, expanding funding for federal financial aid by $36 billion, the largest increase since World War II. With the student loan industry spending millions of dollars to oppose SAFRA, the lobbying that CALPIRG’s higher education advocates did in combination with the grassroots work of students and professional organizers on campus was essential to successfully push our representatives to prioritize students over banks. CALPIRG has used the same tried and true strategy to tackle other major public interest issues, from energy efficiency to renters’ rights.

Lobbying has become a dirty word, but it shouldn’t be. Co-Director of the ASUC Lobby Corps Rachel Horning agrees that “without an organized student voice, our legislators won’t realistically be held to the same standard of service to the hundreds of thousands of concerned California students.” The hired staff of CALPIRG, including their advocates, are what make the difference between ideas and actual results. This is what makes CALPIRG effective: meaningful, powerful change that represents the interests of students and the community.

So thank you to the thousands of students who have pledged CALPIRG!

Lilly Adams is the Berkeley CALPIRG chapter chair. Courtney McDonald is an intern for Berkeley CALPIRG. The op-ed was written with the support of ASUC EAVP Joey Freeman, ASUC Senators Justin Sayarath, Andy Albright, Ju Hong, Elliot Goldstein, Sydney Fang, Noah Ickowitz, Kevin Williams, Shahryar Abbassi, ASUC Lobby Corps Director Rachel Horning, ASUC Sustainability Team Director Judy Li, Cal Habitat for Humanity President J.P. Saunders, Berkeley Political Review Editor-in-Chief Jeremy Pilaar, Professor Robert Hass and Kappa Alpha Fraternity President Garrett Marker.

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