Community Voices Heard

1
Community Voices Heard

• VOTER ENGAGEMENT
• CASE STUDY
• Getting More People Who Usually Dont Vote to
  Vote More Often and in More Elections.

2
Voting in NYS and NYC

• In NYS only 62 of registered voters voted in the
  2004 Presidential Election.
• In NYC 239,022 people were registered in 2004,
  but voter
• turn-out increased by only 39,994.
• In the South Bronx, the average number of
  registered voters
• who vote in a contested state representative
  primary is between
• 5 and 15.

3
Voter EngagementProject Goals

• To build a list of identified voters who support
  progressive economic justice issues in New York
  City.
• To increase voter engagement and turnout in a
  targeted set of election districts to show our
  organizational power in a non-partisan Get Out
  the Vote Project.
• To test, learn and evaluate internal systems and
  external processes in how to best educate about,
  and engage low-income and disenfranchised voters
  in, the political process,
• To continue to operate our successful core grass
  roots direct action and policy organizing work on
  job creation, education and training and income
  support.

4
CVH Voter Project Accomplishments

• Built a data-base of 3127 Voters Identified as
  Economic Justice Voters - People Who Support CVH
  Core Economic Justice Agenda.
• Increased turn-out by an average of 51 in 5
  targeted Election Districts in the NYS Senate
  Primary the 28th Senate District of East Harlem
  and the South Bronx between 2002 and 2004.
• Increased by an average of 19 the number of
  people voting in the State Senate Race in 13
  election districts, between 2000 and 2004.
• Showed an increase of between 12-18 in people
  voting for State Senate in the 13 election
  districts CVH worked in compared to similar
  adjacent election districts in the State Senate
  28.

5
Voter Contact Education Accomplishments

• CVH educated 5778 voters about the electoral
  process, the role of the NYS Senate and pending
  policy issues in NYS.
• CVH conducted a survey poll of 2534 Registered
  Voters about critical economic justice issues
  that the NYS Legislature and City Council deal
  with. A report of the findings will be released
  in late winter.
• CVH registered 2634 new voters, 30 coming from
  the targeted 28th Senate District and
  contributing 7 of the Bronxs new voter
  registrations.
• CVH recruited 1102 low-income registered voters
  to pledge-to-vote in the NYS Senate General and
  Primary Elections.

6
Organizational Accomplishments

• CVH mobilized 177 volunteers to work in the voter
  engagement project and recruited 34 new members
  into the organization through this work.
• CVH trained 6 low-income people to be Voter
  Engagement Organizers.
• CVH maintained our core economic justice direct
  action organizing and grass roots public policy
  work while engaged in electoral work.
• CVH translated our model of political education,
  membership involvement, and independent
  organizing to the CVH Voter Engagement/Electoral
  Organizing Project.

7
CVHs Work in 2004

• Feb-March CVH Voter ID Campaign Kick-Off 2004
  Presidential Primary 825 IDs collected Primary
  Day
• June-August CVH Voter Registration Campaign and
  Develop Outreach and Messaging Strategy 2632
  Voter Registrations
• September-November CVH GOTV in Primary and
  General Election 1102 Voter Pledges

8
September Primary Impact of CVHs Work

• Almost Half of the People CVH talked to
• Voted in the 2004 Senate Primary.
• The CVH Pledge Card Campaign produced 47 Voter
  Participation People Voting.
• The general Voter Participation rate for the same
  
• 5 Districts is only 14.6 .

9
Voter Participation Rates in Sept Primary in 5
Targeted Districts in State Senate 28
10
September Primary Impact of CVHs Work

• Voter turn out increased in CVH targeted
  districts by 51 in the 2004 Primary over the
  2002 Primary.
• In 10 Days CVH contacted 12 of the registered
  voters in one-on-one face to face contacts at the
  door.

11
November General ElectionImpact of CVHs Work

• 78 of people CVH contacted in 13 Targeted
  Districts Voted in the General Election. In the
  Bronx, the turnout was 41.
• 12-18 More Voters in Our Targeted Districts
  Voted for State Senate Compared to Similar
  Adjacent Districts.
• Voter turnout increased 19 in our targeted
  districts in this years election compared to
  the 2000 election.

12
Voter Turn Out - All Bronx and CVH IDd in Bronx
13
CVH Voter Pledge Model

• Contact 1 CVH contacts priority voters at door
  and gets them to pledge to vote.
• Contact 2 CVH calls all voters identified as
  priority
• Contact 3 One week before the election, CVH
  mails to
• Contact 4 The weekend before the election,
  CVH re-knocks the door of all contacts.
• Contact 5 Phone to all pledges Friday,
  Saturday, Sunday and Monday.  
• Contact 6 Election Day door hangers AM.
• Contact 7 Follow up door knock with pledge
  voters contact voters until the polls close
  at 900 PM or until they confirm that they
  voted.
•  
• All of these contacts included political
  education, issue education about pending public
  policy proposals, information about the voting
  process, and where peoples polling places were.

14
Lessons Learned

• Organizational commitment to high levels of
  one-on-one contact is key.
• People are not exercising full political power.
• Civic education is critical and can be done at
  the doors.
• Site-based voter registration is not effective
  for GOTV work.
• Community members / constituents are effective
  voter-engagement organizers.

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Lessons Learned (Cont.)

• Large scale actions can produce a large number of
  voter Ids.
• You cant have too many goals at the door.
• Technological support needs to be a combination
  of internal capacity and external support (TA).
• Staff and organizational capacity needs to be in
  place for effective membership involvement.
• You can do voter engagement and stay consistent
  with a CVH model.

16
Challenges Difficulties

• Political landscape out of our control
• Targeted district and turf issues
• Membership engagement not happening
• Partisan challenges
• Project isolation
• Project funding not in alignment with goals of
  project, coming too late too close to election

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2005 2006 Voter Engagement Plan

• Re-contact all voter contacts-1st priority is
  1200 voter pledge cards.
• Determine new turf with voter match of current
  CVH members.
• Initiate Voter ID and Voter Registration Canvass
  in Targeted Districts
• Recruit, train, and develop volunteer/membership
  teams.
• ID 10-20,000 voters - depending on funding
• Move participants in voter engagement work to CVH
  core policy campaigns.
• Develop and implement GOTV plan for 2005 Mayoral
  elections.
• Conduct voting process or other polling project
  survey project.
• Build base of economic justice voters for 2006
  Gubernatorial campaign.