Are you inspired to help marginalized communities register to vote?
In 2020, many of us were very motivated to ensure that people in marginalized communities in states such as Georgia and Alabama, were encouraged to register to vote. Working with an organization called Reclaim Our Vote, we mobilized more than 150 East Shore members and friends to write many thousands of postcards to these communities. The result was that many more people registered to vote, and in some states that made a difference to the election results.
I’m sure you all know what has happened since then, and how many states have restricted voting rights further. As a church, we do not advocate for any specific party or candidate, but we are very passionate about ensuring that every citizen who wants to vote is able to do so. Since 2022 is another election year, we are gearing up to write postcards again. Are you ready to help?
There will be several different campaigns throughout this year, targeting the primaries of 9 different states:
- Texas primary March 1
- North Carolina primary May 17
- Alabama and Georgia, primaries May 24
- South Carolina primary June 14
- Virginia primary June 21
- Arizona primary August 2
- Florida primary August 23
- Louisiana primary November 8 (tentative)
David Edfeldt is coordinating this project in the role of a wholesaler by purchasing large quantities of postcards up front, and coordinating address label distribution. Lynn Roesch and Marilyn Mayers are collecting postcards from David, printing labels and distributing packets to those who are willing to write. We encourage you to purchase your own stamps if possible, but please let us know if that’s a hardship for you.
We are looking for one or two additional coordinators to help with distributing the cards and labels (from East Shore or your own home). This gives you an opportunity to meet lots of members and work to facilitate writing a lot of postcards. If this project inspires you and you really want to get involved, please contact David, Lynn or Marilyn to offer your support.
If you’d like to write postcards, Lynn or Marilyn will include you in their email lists, and let you know which projects are coming up. Since this is going to be almost a year-long project, there is no need to participate in every campaign. We encourage you to pace yourselves and only take on what you can handle, but of course, we’d love for you to write as many postcards as possible!
The deadline for writing cards for the first campaign, the Texas primary, is February 14. If you’d like to participate, please let Marilyn or Lynn know as soon as possible.
Amanda Strombom, Publicity coordinator, Get Out the Vote campaign