Try finding something out about how to register voters. Go ahead, google “how to register voters” I’ll wait… Oh never mind, I know you're not going to find anything easily and what you find won’t be very useful. (Though if your experience googling is different please add it into the comments.)
Most of what you’ll find is state by state info on how to register yourself to vote. I called one of my party headquarters and was told that “we don’t start till February”. Really? I think we should be doing it every day. We are less than a year away from a Presidential election, I think we’d better hurry up and start registering voters.
I called a different office and was told to register voters at Democratic Fundraisers. I know I’m no expert at this but I would think that anyone going to a political fundraiser would already be a registered voter. After a couple more calls I decided to do what Dr. Ferguson Reid talks about all the time, I decided to “drop down and go around”.
Dr. Reid is the person this group DK Fans of 90 for 90 was founded in honor of. The first black man ever elected to the VA legislature, Dr. Reid turned 90 this year. When friends wanted to throw him a birthday party he said he’d rather register voters instead, so 90for90 was started with the goal of registering 90 new voters in 90 precincts in VA. *A correction here from Gordon 20024, it’s not registering 90 voters in 90 precincts (that would be 90for90for90) it's registering 90 voters in EVERY precinct! Click on the website, they have some pretty impressive supporters.
I’ve been going nutty about registering voters since a year ago when I renewed my drivers license. TN enacted a photo ID requirement for voters so a lot of elderly now need photo’s on their ID’s. Your choice at the DMV is wait 5 hours or use the computers. For some reason the elderly folks here have never needed photo’s on their drivers licenses so now here we all are, trying to get them. Luckily a nice young man stayed behind and helped us all use the computers.
That got me thinking about voter registration and how hard it was going to be for some people to get registered to vote. I wanted to help. I went to NC to find out how they did it and I started talking to Dr. Reid.
I did find one very fun website www.particip8.org/… that had suggestions such as take an ironing board with you hang a “Register to Vote Here” sign on it for that professional look you would probably like to achieve. While this is a goofy idea, I mean, who has an ironing board, the site does give a couple of good tips. The same as Dr. Reid, they say get clipboards and pens. Go where the crowds are. Look for lines and start at the front of the line. That one was really good for me, I would have started at the back of the line.
In keeping with the 90for90 theme, I recently had a birthday party that I called “The Life the Universe and Everything Party”. I had my friends meet me at a pizza place in town and told them not to bring gifts that I was going to ask for a gift (no donor cards needed). We had great pizza, incredible turtle brownies and then I asked for my gift.
Most of my friends are Douglas Adams fans who had read “The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy”, so they knew all about how the people in that book programmed a computer to answer the question of life, the universe and everything. Several thousand years later the computer spit out the answer = 42. So that is the answer to life the universe and everything, now the people just had to figure out what the question was.
I told my gathered friends that I thought I knew what the question was. The answer is 42 and the question is “How many new voters am I personally responsible for registering?” I asked them to please register 42 people as well. They thought it was pretty funny and I gave them each a blank voter registration form and asked them to start with just one.
But how exactly do you go about getting someone to register to vote? Part of that answer is a bit of homework for the DK Fans of 90 for 90. Find out if your state has any rules about registering voters. Do you have to be certified? Is there a limit to the number of people you can register? Are there any rules and regulations?
Getting the blank forms can even be a problem. I was told you could only get one at the post office. Except I live at my post office box and know everyone there. When I asked for “a lot” of forms they gave me all they had up front, a big pile of them.
So, I’ve got the forms, my friends have got their forms, but how do we actually do this? Well, there is a thing I do in dog training, when I’m working with a family who is stuck. I’ve presented them with 5 possible solutions to their problem with their dog, but they’re pretty sure none will work for them. (Tip: if your dog trainer says there's only 1 way to fix something, get another trainer.) I know what will work for the dog and what has worked for thousands of other people but it has to be something the owners of the dog can do.
Here is where I ask them if they drink. If they say yes, I ask them to get paper, pencil and a bottle of wine. Drink the bottle of wine and then brainstorm. It’s a very fun way to solve a problem. Write down every solution that pops into your head. When done the solution will be on the piece of paper, I swear.
That’s what I thought we could do here. Drink it if you have it and throw in any ideas about how and where to register voters. Are there experts who have all this written down? Maybe, but I find fresh eyes and minds can come up with great new ideas and more importantly, what might work for us.
Remember, nothing is too goofy to post.
Need help opening the wine?