Last week, President Obama announced a critical initiative aimed at optimizing the outcome of the mid-term elections for Democrats: Welcome to Vote 2010.
Vote 2010 kicked off with scores of meetings and trainings across the country aimed at preparing volunteers for the organizing tasks that we will face in this important election year. Last week, Femlaw wrote an inspiring diary on recent trainings in California and the importance of Vote 2010. And DNC New Media Director, Natalie Foster, published this moving piece on a training held in the oldest African-American bookstore in the country in San Francisco.
Not to be outdone by the Left Coast, we had several highly-successful events in NYC as well. The indefatigable casperr and her all-volunteer team ran a great event on financial reform and getting ready for the election on Thursday, April 22.
Minna Elias, Chief of Staff to Rep. Carolyn Maloney delivered a crash course in what casperr affectionately called "Wall Street Reform for Dummies" (as in for really smart people who don't work on Wall Street :-)
Approximately 90 people showed up and the venue could comfortably hold 55, so folks were
sitting on every square inch of the floor and spilling out of the room.
After the presentation, attendees broke into groups to exchange ideas about reform, brainstorm about how to discuss it and frame it with voters, and strategize about how to motivate volunteers and voters as we look to November.
Then on Saturday, April 24, Tribeca for Change, a grassroots neighborhood group that collaborates with OFA, delivered an entirely volunteer-planned and run education and training session designed to build the grassroots network in NYC and prepare for the elections in November.
The calm before the storm early on Saturday, April 24, when approximately 125 volunteers attended an education and training session to get fired up and ready to go for November.
Erica Sagrans, blogger for the national office of OFA, wrote a great piece on the event here.
Organizing for America held Camp OFAs across the country last weekend — trainings where volunteers gathered to strategize about 2010, learn the skills they'll need, and get fired up about the road ahead.
Many of our staff at OFA headquarters took advantage of the opportunity to hear from the volunteers who make up the heart of this movement, and were on hand at Camp OFAs from New York to Seattle. I left D.C. Friday night to take part in an event in New York City the following morning. As the warm, sunny day began, New Yorkers were just starting to go outside and ride bikes, walk dogs, and bring kids to play in the park. But in the theater at Dixon Place on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, more than 100 volunteers were gathering to spend the day learning, planning, and gearing up for the fights ahead.
Checking in on the brand-new electronic system designed by volunteers with the help of staff from OFA-NYC.
Deputy Field Director, Geoff Berman, and OFA blogger, Erica Sagrans, enjoying the energy of the arriving volunteers.
Community Organizer (volunteer), Reno, welcoming the crowd and ginning everyone up for a day of great camaraderie and important work.
Geoff Berman took a few mintues to greet attendees and introduce Rep. Weiner.
Although he hadn't known if his schedule would permit a visit, Rep. Weiner came to make the point to new and old volunteers alike that their work is critical and very visible in Washington, D.C.
He went on to say:
"No great piece of reform ever starts in Washington. It starts in places like this, starts in union halls, it starts with people's ideas – it doesn’t start with someone having a bill number in mind. You are honoring our founding fathers by being here on this beautiful Saturday morning. Somewhere, Ben Franklin is looking down and saying, ‘Boy, what a great country we have, because here you are coming off a victory saying,‘How are we going to win the next one?'"
And the crowd agreed with him.
There was more applause when he reminded us that you "can't bring library books to a knife fight." LOL.
Health care expert, Mark Hannay, addressed attendees on the the current bill, and next steps to strengthen the national law and create pilot programs in NYS.
Financial reform expert, Chuck Bell, provided easy-to-understand information and talking points for volunteers to use in speaking with other voters.
I was delighted to be asked to facilitate the breakout groups, during which participants brainstormed on action agendae for health care and financial reform, and the path to victory in November.
The attendees were engaged and focused and motivated all day long.
After a delicious lunch, Community Organizer (volunteer), Alan, passionately primed the group for our final breakouts into Neighborhood Teams. There we devised personal action plans and made activist pledges (my secret training weapon :-) that we shared with each other. I was so excited to discover almost a dozen volunteers in my group (Go Brooklyn, Queeens, and Staten Island!) who were eager to step up to the plate and take on leadership positions organizing their neighborhoods for the first time since November 2008.
This afternoon, Mitch Stewart, Director of OFA, and David Plouffe held an online strategy session for Vote 2010 with tens of thousands of activists and volunteers. If you need some motivation to get moving on this critical initiative, consider this:
- In 2008, 10% of all votes or 15,000,000 votes were cast by first-time voters.
- Also in 2008, among seasoned voters, John McCain and Barack Obama each garnered the same percentage of votes as did George Bush and John Kerry. Among first-time voters, the breakdown was 29% to 71% in favor of the President, and for the win.
- New first-time voters generally vote at half the rate of regular mid-term election voters. Even bumping that turnout up just 8% can mean a difference of 2% in the outcome of many competitive races. If you don't think that matters, think Franken, Tester and Webb -- and Bush in 2000.
I'm pretty much a field geek, so I could go on all night with examples and numbers and studies. I'll be happy to answer any questions in the comments, but suffice it to say that the strategy for Vote 2010 is solid and sound, and will be backed with the resources and tools necessary to get the job done in November.
You can learn more about "Vote 2010" here and find events and trainings in your district or neighborhood. There's even an online voter registration tool for every state in the union. And if you are champing at the bit, you can begin phonebanking now with the great online tool. :-)
Let's get ready to rumble!
And finally, along with the adorable Edith Ann, here's the indomitable committee chair of our event on Saturday, Reno, who deserves all kinds of kudos, along with the rest of the volunteers that planned and ran this training: Alan, Charles, Debo, Jackie, Janna, Joyce, Judy, Judyth, Leslie, Laurie, Ling, Margaret, Onni and Susan. And thanks to casperr for contributing info and photos from Thursday. Finally, special thanks to Bill Gordon, New Media Director of OFA-NY, for most of the photos in the diary. Although I do fancy myself Gumby, it really was impossible to facilitate and photograph simultaneously. :-)