The Fund for Public Interest Research is a national nonprofit organization working to increase the visibility, membership and political power of the nation’s leading environmental and progressive groups.

Leaders of U.S. PIRG, the federation of state PIRGs, started the Fund in 1982 to develop campaigns and technologies to engage Americans in public interest advocacy efforts. Through our fundraising and non-fundraising canvasses, we've raised over $350 million and gathered over 20 million petition signatures over the past 20 years.

Current Fund partners like Sierra Club, Human Rights Campaign, and U.S. PIRG are expanding their donor base and passing tougher legislation against air pollution, forest clear-cutting, hate crimes, and special interest money in politics. We owe our success to the fusion of our staff’s grassroots organizing experience, cost-conscious attitude and work ethic with our partner groups’ issue expertise, initiative and vision.

We're best known for our canvass programs. Over the years we've developed the nation's largest and most effective network for door-to-door and street canvassing—signing up members in high traffic, public places. We sign up sustainers—members who commit to automatic monthly contributions from a checking account or credit card—as well as one-time contributors. We are also one of the nation's most prolific signature gathering operations. We have pioneered other creative outreach methods, like canvassing at concerts and gay pride festivals.

2006 locations: AZ, CA, CO, DC, FL, GA, HI, IL, LA, MA, MD, MI, MN, MO, NC, NJ, NM, NY, OR, PA, TX, UT, WA

Key Staff

The Fund's staff are known for our work ethic. We focus on the craft and training of political outreach, and work hard to see each partner's vision come to life. The top 14 staff of the Fund bring over 150 years of experience to grassroots organizing and fundraising.

Key staff include:

Ed Johnson, National Canvass Director
Ed graduated from Duke University in 1990 with a degree in Public Policy Studies. He started as a canvasser with the Fund in 1990. After five years of running canvass offices, Ed oversaw canvass operations in the Southeast and then California for five years before taking over national canvass operations in 2003. He's based in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Kirk Weinert, Director of Planning
Kirk graduated from Tufts University in 1978 with a degree in political science. He's worked with progressive organizations on all aspects of fundraising for over 25 years.

Sarah Gaudette, Assistant National Canvass Director
Sarah graduated from Boston College in 1997 with a degree in environmental science. She's worked with the Fund on campaigns for eight years and currently oversees canvass operations in the Midwest and a major donor fundraising program for U.S. PIRG.

David Lipowicz, Partnership Program Director
David graduated from Yale University in 2001 with a degree in History. As the Director of the Partnership Program, David manages our relationships with current partner groups and develops new partnerships. David started on Fund staff in 2001 and ran canvass offices for three years, including some of the largest and highest grossing in the Fund’s history.

Ben Flamm, California Regional Canvass Director
Ben graduated from the University of California Santa Barbara in 1998 with a degree in political science. He’s worked on Fund campaigns for seven years and played a key role in developing our first street canvassing programs in 2001. Ben oversees our seven year-round canvass offices in California and has been instrumental in our work to build Environment California, a group launched in 2003 that now has over 80,000 members.

Emily Berens, Recruitment Director
Emily graduated from the Ohio State University in 1998. She's worked on progressive campaigns for five years. In 2003, she ran our annual project to recruit thousands of college students to work on Fund campaigns during their summer break. Currently, Emily runs a project to recruit seniors at the nation's top universities to join the Fund's campaign staff after graduating.