Legal
Privacy Policy
How we collect, use, and protect your information. Plain language, no surprises.
Effective February 10, 2026
AWARE Southeast (“AWARE,” “we,” “us,” or “our”) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and protect your personal information when you use our website at awaresoutheast.org and related services.
1. Information we collect
Information you provide directly
- Alert subscriptions. When you sign up for legislative alerts, we collect your email address and optional topic preferences (e.g., hemp, vape). We use this solely to send you policy update notifications.
- Action Center submissions. When you use our email-your-representative tools, you may provide your name, street address, phone number, and email address. Your address is sent to the U.S. Census Bureau Geocoder API to identify your legislative districts. This information is used only to find your representatives and personalize your message — it is not stored on our servers after your session ends.
- Contact form submissions. When you contact us, we collect your name, email, and message content to respond to your inquiry.
- Community policy tips. When you submit a local policy tip through our reporting tool, we collect the information you provide about the policy. If you choose to include your email, we may follow up for clarification.
- Donations. Donation transactions are processed by third-party payment processors. We do not directly collect or store credit card numbers or bank account information.
Information collected automatically
- Server logs. Our hosting provider may automatically record your IP address, browser type, referring page, and timestamps when you visit our site. These logs are used for security monitoring and are not linked to your identity.
- No tracking cookies. AWARE does not use advertising cookies, third-party analytics trackers, or cross-site tracking pixels. We do not track your browsing behavior across other websites.
2. How we use your information
- To send you legislative alert emails that match your topic preferences
- To look up your legislative districts and match you with your elected representatives
- To respond to your inquiries or policy tip submissions
- To process and acknowledge charitable donations
- To maintain site security and prevent abuse
We do not sell, rent, or share your personal information with any third party for marketing purposes. We do not use your information for profiling, targeted advertising, or any purpose unrelated to our nonprofit mission.
3. Third-party services
We use a limited number of third-party services to operate the platform:
U.S. Census Bureau Geocoder
When you enter your address in the Action Center, it is sent to the Census Bureau's public geocoding API to determine your congressional and state legislative districts. The Census Bureau operates under federal privacy protections. See census.gov/privacy.
Email delivery
Legislative alert emails are sent through our email service provider. Your email address and topic preferences are shared with this provider solely for the purpose of delivering your alerts.
Payment processing
Charitable donations are handled by third-party payment processors who maintain their own privacy policies and PCI-DSS compliance. We receive only the information necessary to issue donation receipts.
4. Data retention
- Alert subscriptions are retained until you unsubscribe. You can unsubscribe at any time using the link in any alert email or by visiting your alert preferences page.
- Address and representative lookups are processed in real-time and are not stored on our servers. Your address is sent directly to the Census API and discarded after the response is returned to your browser.
- Contact form messages are retained for the time necessary to respond to your inquiry, then deleted.
- Donation records are retained as required by IRS regulations for tax-exempt organizations.
5. Your rights
You have the right to:
- Unsubscribe from alert emails at any time
- Request deletion of any personal information we hold about you
- Request a copy of any personal information we have collected from you
- Opt out of any future communications from us
To exercise any of these rights, email info@awaresoutheast.org with the subject line “Privacy Request.” We will respond within 30 days.
6. Children's privacy
Our services are intended for users aged 18 and older. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If we learn that we have inadvertently collected such information, we will delete it promptly.
7. Security
We use industry-standard security measures to protect your personal information, including HTTPS encryption for all data transmitted between your browser and our servers. However, no method of transmission over the internet is 100% secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.
8. Changes to this policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. When we make changes, we will update the effective date at the top of this page. If we make material changes to how we handle your personal information, we will notify alert subscribers by email.
9. Contact
If you have questions about this Privacy Policy or how we handle your information, contact us at: