Until we get a countdown clock going, I'd like to take a few minutes each day (or weekday depending on how my internet connection is at home) to remind everyone of two very important events.
1. Election day is May 15th. That, according to a countdown clock on Philadelphia Safe and Sound's "Safe Kids, Sound Futures" website, is 68 days away.
"So what," you may be saying, "I'll be ready to vote." Sometimes, in the interest of ensuring that the process is as clean and accurate as possible, you need to do more than just vote. You need to volunteer. The Committee of Seventy and Greater Philadelphia Cares are giving you a great chance to do just that.
You can be an "Election Watchdog" (grrrrr ruff-ruff), a "Data Collector" (please be a data collector, we NEED more information about how these elections actually work) or a "Hotline Helper." If you read this blog regularly, then we know you're interested in helping to make sure that this election is decided based on the merits of the candidates and their campaigns, not on some masterpiece of electoral fraud.
So yes, the election is 68 days away, but volunteers are needed as soon as possible for training and orientation.
You'll be getting frequent reminders of this opportunity.
2. April 16th is the LAST DAY TO REGISTER TO VOTE. If you want a say in which of the 5 Deomcratic Party candidates for mayor receives the nomination or if you want to choose among the several Democratic candidates for City Council seats, you have to register as a Democrat. If you're registered as a Republican, you can choose the 1 mayoral candidate on the ballot and the City Council challengers for the at-large nominations. There are other races down ticket but these are the major ones.
If you register as anything but a Democrat or Republican, YOU CAN STILL VOTE ON BALLOT QUESTIONS. But you must be registered as something in order to participate. Information about how to register and a link to a .pdf of the actual registration form can be found here.
If you're wondering, April 16th is 38 days away!
Comments (1)
Good post.
In addition, I believe the Republican party is only fielding 5 candidates for at-large city council, so they're all pretty much guaranteed to go through to the general election. I'm also not aware of any district council races that have more than one Republican challenging, so ditto for those. While I wouldn't necessarily encourage anyone to switch parties and stay switched, it might be prudent for people who are following the 5-way Democratic primary and have a favorite candidate to switch just for the primary, then switch back.
Finally, if you can't use the PDF registration form on Seventy's website for some reason, there's also this other nifty registration form:
http://www.dos.state.pa.us/bcel/lib/bcel/voter_registration/01_staticpage/voterregistrationapp.html
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March 9, 2007 3:14 PM