Dear Marilyn,

As we juggle community priorities, the unrelenting challenge of state and county budget cuts, and the drama of an historical presidential election, California grassroots advocates are confronting a year of critical decision making that can either further or jeopardize the essential rights of women and girls.

To make a difference and have an impact on these decisions, we know from 12 years of coalition building that collaborative and sustainable networks are crucial to being ready for 2009 and a new era.

Your membership in CAWA (California Women's Agenda) is part of this solution.

Whether you are a new or renewing member, let's reaffirm why your continued organization membership in CAWA is valued and valuable. Let's look at what we have done and where we need to go together.

What has CAWA been doing during these critical times? We began building regional alliances and electronic-action networks following the Beijing Conference in 1995 when we took up the challenge to implement the Beijing Platform for Action (BPFA) at the grassroots of California. Since then CAWA has become a significant hub for interconnecting local, state, national and international issues of concern to women and girls.

CAWA takes pride in twelve years as a network that organizes, with one million women connected in California alone and one million miles traveled globally. For the full story on these groundbreaking initiatives, please see the attached "What we have done together", "What we can do with your support", then visit our website and learn how to become more involved.

The networks that we build, the policy mechanisms that we put in place, and the systems to support them on the world wide web - this is what we are about and how we make a difference.

Next Steps: We must now move into the next phase of the post-Beijing conference era with wise and prophetic planning. To that end, we are actively engaged in advocating for a Fifth World Conference on Women and in California we will preparre for inclusion in the US Women's Agenda and UN Beijing+15 agendas at a CAWA Leadership Summit in mid-November 2008 following the national election.

We encourage leaders, such as you, to step forward as our "Wise Women" Aileen Hernandez, steps up to Chair Emerita, and Marilyn Fowler, WIN CEO, steps back from the front lines to fine-tune CAWA's electronic infrastructure and ground operations with WIN Communications Director, Anna Marks.

CAWA Tomorrow: We have reached the next crossroad. If we are to keep the network powerful, we need your participation, your leadership and your financial support to keep turning on the switch that powers our network. Thanks to you and the nurturing by our 'mothership' WIN, which has supported and operated CAWA from the beginning, there has been tremendous growth. However, let's face it, the increase in policy and legislative demands has stretched our resources to the limit, at the same time, support from the philanthropic community has become stagnant in a depressed economy.

Our most reliable support has always been from our base - the women and participating organizations in the CAWA network. Without it, CAWA cannot continue the timely in depth information, analysis, action alerts, and instant responses necessary to keep California women and girls on top of breaking issues and crises that are facing us daily.

What can you do? For a start, you can PAY IT FORWARD, if each organization or individual pays an annual membership fee on a sliding scale of $10 to $100, we can continue to maintain a dynamic network on the ground and on the Internet. But there is more you can do and get from CAWA.

It's easy. All you need to do is click the Donate button on our website, or print out and mail in the online CAWA Membership Form.

This simple action and your support is an affirmation of why we have joined together and must keep on moving forward. Individually we may inspire, but working together we transform.

The women of California are counting on you as an organization partner for the coming new era of public policy challenges.

Please send your support to the California Women's Agenda as soon as possible and we will mail you CAWA's most recent "Report and Plan of Action," and for a $100 membership, you will have your choice of a WIN/CAWA CD or DVD!

With sincere thanks and in peace, The WIN-CAWA team