Summer Involvement: Voter Registration & Education in Western PA

The real work of democracy is never done. The real work of democracy is involvement at every level of governance. We need to reach out to even more people and ask them to register to vote. We need to make sure more people, more democrats, vote in November.

There are several races in Western PA that need our help. If we are to have more democratic elected officials working to safeguard the future of PA and our democratic values, then we need to act.

The National Democratic Party is asking people to volunteer to be neighborhood leaders and talk to 25 people about voting and elections at least three times before November. But, we can do so much more!

We could have voter registration drives throughout the summer at fairs and carnivals or even yard sales and picnics!?

This is the first step in getting our democratic candidates, such as Mark McCraken for the 5th district Congressional Race, Don Hilliard for the 25 state senate district, and the presidential democratic nominee into office. (Please tell me about the other candidates running in our area who need our help!)

More people need to be ready to participate in elections! Since January, we have already registered 218,923 new voters! 70 % are democrats! Of those, 164,026 people changed their party from republican to democrat!

We can do voter registration outreach by setting up at the various town and county fairs in Jefferson, Clearfield, Clarion, Centre, and Elk Counties (forgive me if I left yours out). I think we should each suggest this kind of action to the people in our democratic committees as well as to our friends and family. Find out what you can about what it will cost to set up at your favorite fair.

Setting up at fairs and carnivals will cost money. To fund the table, I suggest getting donated baskets to raffle to try to fund the tables or, as one person suggested, we can set up a dunking pool--which would be great fun!

Please try to think of other forums were we can target unregistered citizens. Let's continue to get more people involved with democracy!

Even if you are just having yard sale, why not put out a few voter registration forms or ask for educational materials on our democratic candidates. We can set up in malls, outside of grocery stores, and a variety of places.

We just need people who are willing to make it happen. I truly believe more regular Americans would be democrats if they understood our values and did not believe the conservative hype.

My mom told me how her grandmother, a woman who knew what it meant to be denied the right to vote, used to gather with women in the area to discuss politics. We Americans have begun to take this right for granted.

We need to make politics something that every person cares about, and we need to help them see that being involved in politics is so much more than the cult of personality nonsense they see on FOX and CNN. Politics is very local, and it affects each of our lives.

If we are not telling our elected officials at every level of government what we need and expect, then we deserve what we get: nothing! We also need more efforts to educate voters.

I urge each of you to write about candidates in letters to the editor or on your blogs. Tell your friends and family why you are going to vote for candidates. We need more coverage of our local politics in our papers. You can do this through letters to the editor, and by contacting news editors about story ideas.

We need people who are willing to educate people about the decisions that are happening in their own towns and counties that affect how they can do business and go about their regular lives.

Please post your ideas on how or where to set up voter registration drives or coordinate efforts to educate voters about democratic candidates and local/regional politics.

All ideas are welcome.