Meet more than 100 grassroots organizations advocating for issues that matter to Texans

Hundreds of Texans across the state are organizing around policy issues they care about, whether it’s reducing gun control or legalizing marijuana. These Texans hope to shape politics in our state by acting inside and outside the Capitol, holding rallies, lobbying lawmakers and offering services and resources to the communities they represent.

We wanted to learn more about these grassroots groups and the role they play in Texas politics, so we asked readers to tell us about the organizations that matter most to them. Over the past several months, we’ve received over 100 submissions of unique Texas grassroots groups. 

Now, we present this grassroots database as a resource to our readers. By sorting and searching the data, you can find groups organizing around the issues that are important to you.

For each organization, we defined issues (the main issues this group organizes around) and geographic focus (what community is affected or engaged by this organization). We also included a brief description for each organization, which was provided by members or pulled from online profiles and edited for clarity.

This database will be updated as we get new submissions from our readers. If you don’t see your organization in the list below, please complete this short form or email our reporter Alex Samuels directly at asamuels@texastribune.org. Our goal is make this database a resource that grows and evolves to reflect the wide range of issues that matter to Texans of all backgrounds.

Meanwhile, here’s an overview of 106 grassroots groups represented in the directory so far.

What issues are these groups organized around?

The grassroots groups reported by our readers organize around a wide range of issues, from gun rights to immigration reform.

The top five issues targeted by the 106 organizations are: elections and campaign finance (42 percent), civil rights (39 percent), education (K-12) (12 percent) and the environment (11 percent).

Other topics represented include immigration (8 percent), energy and health care (7 percent each), and jobs and the economy (5 percent).

If you know of a grassroots group that is not in our database, please let us know about it.

What regions do these groups represent?

Half of the organizations on our list act on a statewide level, which means they are either engaging people throughout Texas, lobbying for or against statewide laws or are a state organization with local chapters. The other half are more locally focused. That group is evenly split between local chapters of national movements and stand-alone local organizations.

We didn’t get as many responses from local organizations, but we know Texans care about many issues that are specific to certain regions. Do you know of any other local organizations? Tell us about them!