Part two of three exploring the ups and downs of canvassing for the reduction of air pollution in Chicago.

At 11:30, the field managers announced the achievements of the canvassing offices, the individual canvassers. At the end of the praising and slogan spewing, one office manager announced the breakup of teams under the different field managers into the different fields.

People were then sent to neighborhoods, where they were assigned an eight-block section. Then for five hours the canvassers individually went to people’s doors, explaining the issue and asking for a donation.

At 9 P.M. the day was done and the canvassers met as a team to go back to the office and check in their cash. If all goes well the canvasser could finish before 10, at which time a restaurant was designated for “social,” and everyone went there to chow down on pizza or burgers or very cheap Chinese.

Depending on how things go, canvasser Kristen might make it home by 10:30, or end up stumbling her way to the doorstep in the wee hours of the morning, realizing that the newspaper has beaten her home.

The salary of the canvasser is primarily made in the hours spent knocking on doors, using a speech called “the rap.” “The rap” is the ultimate form of manipulation. The canvasser has every single word memorized and rehearsed, from the very first “Hi, how are you?” to the last “Thank you so much for this large donation. With your membership, we will be able to continue our fight against air pollution.”

People are forced to stand there at the door through the entire piece until they can find a time to say that they need to get back to washing the baby, eating dinner, or talking on the phone with their aging grandmother.

At this point the canvasser says that they will give them the short version, and continues on with the rap. If someone is very insistent on slamming the door in their face, the canvasser can ask “Are you with me on the issue of air pollution?”

Supposedly, there is no one out there who wants soot and smog in their backyard, even though a few have replied “No, I’m not!” and slammed the door. With any luck, the person will be kind, gregarious, intelligent and generous enough to fund the canvasser’s cause and pocket book.

One might ask, why it is so important to collect more than just names on a petition? There are two answers to that question: one is that names on a paper signify nothing – people will sign anything just to get the passionate off their back, so a dollar amount proves that people care about the issue enough to contribute to its resolution.

The other reason is that canvassers are paid not on hourly wages but on commission. Quota is a hundred dollars a day for five days, giving them three hundred dollars a week. But very few canvassers always make quota.

Next week part three sums up with the dilemmas facing our canvasser.