Delivering Results: An Overview of Federal Implementation Processes

Updated March 16, 2022

Summary

Activists, organizers, and everyday people fight hard for policies that ensure every family has the chance to thrive. However, our communities will only experience the full benefits of a law if it is implemented in a way that puts equity first. The way regulations are enforced or federal funds are spent can make the difference between window-dressing the status quo and transformational change.

One great example of the importance of community involvement is the disability community’s advocacy to ensure that newly enacted civil rights protections were implemented in a meaningful way. Congress forbade discriminiation in employment on the basis of disability in Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. However, in order for people with disabilities to truly hold employers accountable, the Health, Education, and Welfare agency (HEW) needed to issue regulations telling employers how to interpret the statute. Under pressure from big corporations, HEW delayed issuing the regulations for years. Disability rights groups continued campaigning for the regulations until HEW finally issued draft regulations in 1977. When the Carter administration took office and attempted to weaken the existing draft regulations, activists led sit-ins and protests nationwide until the regulations were finally instituted with no change.

Disability rights activists ensured that Section 504 was implemented in a way that supported their community. They understood that just passing laws was not enough. We have to keep fighting for the change we need at every step of the process. Without sustained community organizing, policymaking favors entrenched special interests with the power, access, and funding to engage in drawn-out and complex implementation processes.

This explainer is intended to support community organizers working to ensure that the demands of the people closest to the problems are reflected in the final policy. It lays out the three primary ways policies are implemented: rulemaking, grant funding, and plan development. For each, it will explain the process, the stakeholders, the timeline, and key intervention points that can transform the outcome. This includes delaying tactics that slow the implementation of harmful legislation, or which may be used by moneyed interests to impede our activism,