Most people think advocacy works like this:

Show up in Washington, make your case, ask for what you need. Then sit back and hope it gets done.

Reality is messier. And slower.

Building a congressional caucus is a many-month chess match. Behind every public announcement (and there will be many) are months of quiet conversations, strategic recruiting, and relationship building that never make the camp news boards.

With this in mind, let’s go through how this works.

It Started in May

Last spring, ACA organized Hill Days. That’s our annual trek to Capitol Hill. Over two days, camp professionals visited 150+ congressional offices.

We weren’t asking for anything specific, other than making sure our J-1 programs ran smoothly. We were planting seeds.

In each meeting, we mentioned we’d be forming a Congressional Camp Caucus. Just a teaser. We gauged reactions and identified who lit up at the idea — who had great camp memories or kids in camp, who had camp connections in their district.

We left behind one-pagers showing the impact camps have on their constituents:

The ways campers learn and grow

The positive mental health outcomes

The workforce development angle

The million young people we employ each summer

The goal here wasn’t to get commitments. It was intelligence gathering.

Who’s already camp-friendly? Who needs more education? Who might say yes when we circle back?

The Co-Sponsor Hunt

Before opening the caucus to general membership, you need bipartisan leadership. One Democrat and one Republican willing to put their names on it in each house of Congress.

This is the quiet phase.

And great news here: Rep. Chris Pappas (D-NH) said yes almost immediately. He got it. His office actually reached out proactively after Hill Days. He said yes before we even had final details about what the caucus would do.

That’s how you know it's a good fit.

Now we’re searching for the Republican partner. There are a few great candidates. Folks with camp or education backgrounds or from camp-heavy states.

The pitch is simple: “We’ll staff it. We’ll handle everything. Quarterly briefings. Quality people. A worthy cause. You be there when we need you. That’s it.”

See, the thing is, there are hundreds of caucuses on Capitol Hill.

Members want their participation to be meaningful, but they don’t want it to be burdensome. They don’t want their already stretched staff running another initiative.

So, we’re making it easy. ACA and our partners do the work. They lend the political weight.

Why This Isn't Lobbying (Yet)

Caucus building counts as education and community building. Not lobbying.

We’re not asking anyone to vote on specific legislation right now. We’re raising awareness. Building relationships. Making sure when camp-related issues surface, we’re already part of the conversation.

Much more about this in the coming weeks.

Because make no mistake, this is the long game.

Take workforce development. Camps employ a million young people every summer. Right now, we aren’t really part of the system that exists for job training. Camps get almost nothing from the billions in federal workforce development funding.

Someday, when the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act comes up for reauthorization, we’ll have members of Congress who already understand why camps matter and the ways in which we provide critical workforce development for young people. The wheels will already be greased.

That’s when education becomes lobbying. And by then, it’s a much shorter conversation.

Once both cosponsors are confirmed, we start building out our membership list, and then we go public.

Follow-up emails to all 150 offices we visited. Scheduling more meetings. Building the roster one member at a time.

The target: 30–100 members in the first phase. Maybe more. Other caucuses range from 50–200+. Ours will grow as the work proves valuable.

The timeline: Core group established by spring. Momentum builds from there.

The Work Is Already Underway

This isn’t dramatic. It’s strategic.

Every conversation matters. Every one-pager left behind. Every relationship built over coffee in a congressional office building.

The Congressional Camp Caucus will launch publicly in the coming months. But the real work, the work that determines whether it succeeds (and it will), is happening right now.

Patient. Deliberate. Already underway.

Join the movement. Get updates on the Camp Caucus and learn how you can support camp advocacy in DC.

Scott Brody is ACA’s Government Affairs co-chair and leads the association’s advocacy efforts in Washington, DC. He served as ACA National Board Chair during the COVID-19 crisis, helping guide camps nationwide through safe reopening while securing unprecedented federal support. A camp director for more than 30 years, Scott is Director Emeritus of Camps Kenwood & Evergreen and owner of Everwood Day Camp and Camp Sewataro. He has dedicated his career to advancing the life-changing impact of camp and championing its value on a national stage.

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