A California public affairs firm for the fights you can’t afford to lose.
Name the bill, the board or the opponent. We will show you who funds the members you need, who already lobbies them, and who has the relationship. Fifteen minutes. With sources.
Who we help
Companies, developers, trade associations, nonprofits and the lobby firms that represent them. Three situations, each with its own page.
Companies, developers and in-house teams
You need a permit, a rule change or a vote, and you pay three or four shops against one budget. Nobody has laid their relationships side by side. We show you where they overlap and where the gaps are.
Trade associations and nonprofits
You are a board, a small staff and a lobbyist, and your members want to know what the dues bought. We build the coalition, the campaign and the organization behind them.
Lobby and public affairs firms
A client asks for research, creative or a coalition, and nobody on your team is free to staff it. We are that capacity, under your name. The client stays yours.
What we do
Research tells you where to push. These are the ways we push, and they work best aimed at a target the research has already picked out.
Coalitions built from people who already know the member
Logos on a letter do not move a vote. We find the supporters who already have a relationship with the member you need, and we can usually name them before anyone makes a call.
Ads aimed at your own list, not a lookalike of it
Most advocacy media buys reach people who resemble your members. We reach your members, donors and site visitors, then report how many we reached, how often, and how many came back.
Legislators and regulators on the record
Interviews with the people who decide your issue, in their own words. Your members watch them. So do the colleagues you are trying to move.
One place for the argument and the evidence
Supporters, reporters and legislative staff find the case and the sources under it in one place. Built for the week a bill moves, not for a brochure.
The argument where legislators now have it
Members and stakeholders argue in public now, and the people you need read it. We have used that to help stop a bill.
Leave-behinds built for four minutes between hearings
Infographics, one-pagers and handouts for a reader with no background on your issue. Complexity is the enemy of a yes.
Anyone can write an opposition letter. Knowing who has to say yes is the work.
Four tools, one question each. The filings: which of the people you already pay has the relationship with this chair, measured rather than asserted. The seats: which board that regulates you has a term ending inside a year. The budget: what happened to your line between the January proposal and the final vote. The calendar: which rule touching your sector was noticed this quarter, and when the window shuts. Every answer carries the record it came from.
The disclosures are public. The connections are not.
We do not allege anything. We organize what California has already disclosed, every figure keeps its source, and it is written for review rather than accusation.
Every free assessment starts here. You name the fight, and we show you who is already in the room.
What our clients say
“We were a smaller association looking to develop a presence in Sacramento. Today, we are the State’s leading voice for rental housing providers in the Capitol and at the ballot box, thanks to Highview Strategies. Their political foresight helped us prepare for threats and secure major policy changes for our members.”
Sid LakireddyFormer President, California Rental Housing Association
“His command of state and local government, combined with sharp political judgment, makes Russell the advisor you want at the table when decisions matter most.”
Cheryl SudduthChair, California African American Water Education Foundation
Who you would be working with
Highview Strategies is a Sacramento public affairs firm. Russell Lowery, our managing partner, spent 25 years in California and Washington politics before founding it: senior legislative staff, Chief Deputy at the Board of Equalization, and lobbyist for the largest utility in the state.
He is also executive director of the California Rental Housing Association and the California African American Water Education Foundation. We do not only advise associations. We run two.
Every client we have works with people on Capitol Weekly’s Top 100. That is the room we have been in for two decades, and it is where your bill, rule or permit gets decided.
Why work with us
You get a straight answer on your odds first.
If the votes are not there, we say so before you spend a dollar. We would rather lose the engagement than spend a year of your budget on a fight you were never going to win.
You find out who is already in the room.
Before anyone makes a call, you know who funds the members you need, who lobbies them, and who has the relationship. Every line is sourced, so you can hand it to your board.
Your lobbyist keeps the account.
We do not lobby the Legislature directly, and we do not replace the shop you have. If your lobbyist is good, our work makes that visible.
You hire people who run organizations, not just advise them.
We have sat on the board side of the table, so we know what a board needs to hear in a bad quarter, and what members ask when the dues come due.
Fights we have won
Three rent-control initiatives. Three defeats.
Three times in six years a statewide rent-control initiative reached the ballot. Three times the state’s rental housing providers asked us to help defeat it. Propositions 10, 21 and 33 each failed by about 60 to 40.
An air district made to count the cost
The Bay Area Air Quality Management District has a history of passing expensive regulations with negative consequences for everyone in the region. We helped build a real coalition, not astroturf. Real meetings with the community, to demand an economic analysis with real teeth. When we started, people thought it was impossible. It eventually passed unanimously.
Tell us what you need decided.
A bill, a rule, a permit, a board seat or an opponent. We are glad to talk it through before anyone signs anything.
- Emailrussell@highviewstrat.com
- Phone916-710-2872
- Office1121 L Street, Suite 105
Sacramento, CA 95814
What happens next
Russell reads every message himself and replies within one business day. The first conversation covers the fight, who decides it, and whether a free assessment is worth running. Nothing is owed either way.