Michigan LCV Ed Fund highlights results of $1.3 million ‘Democracy For All’ program recruiting poll workers and helping voters participate

LANSING – The Michigan League of Conservation Voters Education Fund today released initial results of its $1.3 million 501c3 non-partisan campaign focused on poll worker recruitment and one million direct voter contact effort, heading into the November election. The campaign launched in April to address unprecedented challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic and statewide shortage of poll workers. More than 30 partner organizations are involved in the coalition that is driving the campaign.

 

To date, our Michiganvoting.org coalition has recruited and sent to the Secretary of State 7,645 confirmed poll worker recruits. More than 300 of those recruits are bilingual, many speaking Spanish, Arabic or Bengali. Poll workers were recruited through a mixture of social media, partnerships, paid media and other outreach efforts. In late August, Michigan LCV Ed Fund launched a $150,000 radio and digital ad campaign targeted at the I-75 corridor.

 

“COVID-19 has brought us unprecedented challenges when it comes to voting, and ensuring safe and equitable access to the ballot by having enough poll workers to get the job done,” said Clare Allenson, civic engagement director for Michigan LCV. “Along with our partners, we designed our program to target communities most in need of poll workers, including cities like Detroit, Flint, Saginaw and Dearborn. The response has been phenomenal and we are continuing to press on to ensure we have all the poll workers we need to uphold our democracy on Election Day.”

These efforts have been executed in partnership with more than 30 partner organizations, including the Grow Detroit’s Young Talent program; All Voting Is Local; ACLU of Michigan; the League of Women Voters of Michigan; NAACP Detroit; Voters Not Politicians; labor unions like AFSCME, MI AFL-CIO, and SEIU, and Power The Polls, a national organization working on the issue.

 

Michigan LCV Education Fund’s sizable Direct Voter Contact (DVC) program has centered for months around chasing down registered voters through phone calls and text messages to encourage them to apply and Vote@Home. We are walking voters through how to submit ballots through drop boxes, satellite offices or by mail until Oct. 19.

To date, our program has made 846,301 attempted phone calls with a total of 73,341 successful contacts with Michigan voters. The effort has resulted in 5,360 registered voters committing to vote by mail. All contacts receive text message reminders and additional communications from Michigan LCV Education Fund after our initial contact.

Our goal by the end of the campaign is to reach one million voter contact attempts.

 

More information about the campaign, partner organizations and resources for voters can be found at Michiganvoting.org.