The Illinois Policy Institute is building an engaged digital audience to continuously communicate with more than 1 million Illinoisans. Especially engaged members of IPI’s owned audience apply to join IPI’s activist group of more than 17,000 members, the Lincoln Lobby. During the initial days of the mandatory business shutdowns in Illinois, IPI saw an uptick in small-business owner applicants to the Lincoln Lobby. IPI is now featuring the stories of several Lincoln Lobbyists, giving business owners an outlet to talk about the economic effects of the shutdown and the policy solutions needed for recovery.

In the last week of March 2020, we published the story of Kristan Vaughan, a Lincoln Lobbyist and small business owner dealing with the crisis. Kristan explained, “We run Irish pubs… The to-go business on corned beef sandwiches is good [but] I’m not sure what will happen tomorrow. The staff ask me what will happen. I’m supposed to have the answers because I’m the boss. But I don’t know. I can’t say when we’ll be open.”

The community response has been incredible—IPI’s featured business owners are seeing a flow of orders from Illinoisans who want to provide support during the shutdown. These stories are reaching hundreds of thousands of people organically on social media and they’re illustrating the connection between critical policy issues and how these issues impact Illinoisans’ daily lives. Our readers’ actions demonstrate that telling the stories of real people can help advance life-changing policies.