So you thought everybody in American PR, like everyone in America, was obsessed with the race for president? If you did, you would be wrong.

Obviously you never heard of the Michigan election. No, not THAT election in Michigan. I mean the election about the hottest thing going in Michigan – passing a state version of universal health care. You thought Florida was make or break for Giuliani? Maybe or maybe not, but it sure is just that for a proposal to roll back Florida property assessments. And don’t forget those hot button campaigns like the right to sell liquor in Colorado grocery stores, allow slots at the track in Maryland, and that perennial, changing term limits (again!) in California.

All of these efforts, and there are others, require as much organization and energy as any presidential campaign, if not more. Unlike a presidential campaign, where a candidate’s name recognition can blossom overnight (see: Mike Huckabee and Barack Obama) giving household name opponents the fits (see: Rudy Giuliani and Hillary Clinton), ballot issues like the ones above can have little or no recognition from the public. Particularly in the shadow of an attention-getting presidential campaign, trying to explain the pros and cons of an issue, generally an issue can be demanding.

Worse yet, this assumes that supporters have actually managed to get their favorite issue on the ballot at all. No issue just appears on an Election Day ballot. Like the candidates themselves, issues find their way onto the ballot because enthusiastic volunteers (OK, maybe some paid “volunteers” too) have spent endless hours rounding up signatures to put them there for your consideration. Press reports tell a story of heroic efforts by true believers. It is no small thing, for example, to garner 380,000 signatures for your favorite cause. Likewise, a simple press conference is not going to get your cause the kind of attention it needs when news directors are swamped with precious minutes for a newscast and stories pouring through the door on everything from Iraq to the presidential election to the latest freeway accident or house fire.

The Internet, as always, adds a whole other flavor to local issues. If you have a tax issue you are dealing with in your state, for example, there are groups both in Washington and around the country who may have both the shared interest and – even better – deeper pockets that can lend your cause a serious hand.

And you thought you only had to start an early campaign if you were running for the White House? Think again. Just as candidates start popping up in New Hampshire every four years – or even more – before the next presidential primary, so too must issue activists begin by understanding the election cycle of their own state or locality and get moving. The focus begins with the basics: what is the election date, what are the rules and how much time is there before you’re voters start streaming into the polls to give your side a yes or no answer?

So if you’ve got what you think is a hot issue that needs to be decided directly by the people in your state, that is if you’re lucky enough to live in one of the roughly 24 or less (check) states that permit ballot questions like these – well – what are you doing reading this? Time, as they say, is a’wasting.