How to Contact Your Texas Legislators

Communicating with your local and state officials can be as simple as writing an email or making a phone call. You can visit your official’s local office or attend town hall meetings. If possible, get to know your representatives before Legislative session begins. When the Texas legislature is in session you can testify during hearings, talk to lawmakers and their staff at their Capitol offices.
Texans can easily find their representatives, and their respective contact information, through Texas Legislature Online, TLO.

Here are the steps:

• Log on to TLO https://capitol.texas.gov/.
• In the page’s lower right corner find “Who Represents Me?” Enter your address. You will see your elected representatives from national to Texas state level.
• Click on the legislator you are wanting to contact and a screen will pop up with a box in the upper right hand corner titled E-MAIL YOUR _____. That has a form to create an email to your selected representative.

To maximize your impact, it is best to have researched the issues and bills being considered. You can do this through TLO. Near the top center of the home page, you will find “Search Legislation.” Be sure to select the current Legislature, “89(R) – 2025” to get bills for the current session. You can enter the number of the bill. If you don’t know the specific number for the bill, you can use the “Word/Phrase” option. That will show you several bills that are related to your interests. When you contact a legislator by email about a topic or bill, be specific and state your concerns in a positive, polite manner. Start with the positive before the negative. List Bill number(s) when available.

To go beyond an initial email or call, ask for the legislative aide for that topic to contact you and give your contact information. If you contact your legislator in person, plan to stay 10 -15 minutes or less and when calling the office, be prepared and talk only a few minutes.
Express your stand on a certain issue by providing specific examples of why you support or oppose an issue, bill, or law. Be brief and focused on one issue. Elected officials or their staff want your perspective on how a bill impacts you. The staff will keep track of how many people take a position on a bill or issue. Watch this example from Texas Impact, “Faithful Advocacy: Betsy Calls Her Legislator”, https://youtu.be/uWgYO4uID7Y?feature=shared
You can make a difference. Just remember that specific legislation may take three or more legislative sessions to get enough traction to be passed. That means you might need to be dedicated to more than one legislative session.

Meg Scott-Johnson, Public Policy Committee Member
Georgia Kimmel, Public Policy Chair