Full Calendar

In Memoriam.

 

Amherst Girls' Leadership Day: 1-2-3 Girls LEAD!

On Thursday, October 4, the Amherst League of Women Voters is sponsoring a Girl's Leadership Day, "1-2-3 Girls LEAD!" Its purpose is to teach a group of girls from Amherst Regional High School how to become effective leaders: to help them gain confidence, learn skills, and practice techniques which are important for young leaders. Skills such as speaking, marketing, organizing and collaborating will be taught by experts in their field.

 

The LWV hopes to have a diverse group of 20-25 girls (7 or 8 from each grade 10-12) for this program, which has been approved as a school activity by ARHS Principal Mark Jackson. The event is not intended for girls who are already considered leaders. Instead, we hope to have girls with different voices and backgrounds who would like to learn leadership skills. Response to the program has been enthusiastic;  all spaces have been filled.  

 

There will be a follow-up session in the Spring of 2019, and throughout the year the LWV workshop leaders will stay in touch with the participants to act as resources and mentors.  

 

The keynote speaker will be Democratic nominee for Third District Representative and LWVAmherst member Mindy Domb, who will address the topic, "What Makes a Good Leader?" Amherst School Committee chair Anastasia Ordonez, a marketing consultant, will lead a workshop on "How to Promote Your Cause." Workshop Coordinators are Cynthia Brubaker and Rebecca Fricke.  

 

--Cynthia Brubaker and Rebecca Fricke

Fall Candidate Forum for Amherst Town Council on October 23

The League of Women Voters will hold three "mini-forums" for the 26 candidates for the new Amherst Town Council on Tuesday, October 23, between 6 and 9 p.m. in the auditorium of the Amherst Regional Middle School.  

 

The schedule is:  

 

6 to 7:15 p.m.: Districts 1, 2 and 3 (12 candidates) 

7:22 to 8:01: At-large candidates (6 candidates)

8:08 to 8:59: Districts 4 and 5 (8 candidates)  

 

Unlike most LWVA candidate forums, we will not be taking questions from the floor in this tightly-scheduled event. Instead, the Voter Service Committee has come up with three questions (the same for all candidates) that it hopes will elicit individuality and specificity in candidate responses. The questions are based on questions submitted during the August 29 forum for the at-large candidates. Those covered a wide gamut of issues, and we were able to use only a fraction in that forum.  

 

The lobby of the auditorium will have several tables for candidate materials and will be available for candidates when they are not on stage.  

 

The League will also publish another election guide for these candidates in the November 2 Amherst Bulletin.

 

--Kathy Campbell

From the Voter Registration Committee

The LWVA Voter Registration Committee met and is very excited about organizing to enroll voters for 2018 as well as 2020.  Alice Swift, one of our long-term members, provided a training for all of those new to the actual process of voter registration. The training was helpful, interesting and fun.  

 

Here are a few of our recent Voter Registration events:

	Barbara Pearson at march. Note hat!

 

-You may have read about the student march from Worcester to Smith and Wesson headquarters in Springfield, "50 Miles More," Thursday August 23- Sunday, August 26. The marchers called on Smith and Wesson to stop making weapons outlawed in Massachusetts' 2004 Assault Weapons Ban.

Amherst LWV's Barbara Pearson was there to register voters. Barbara commented: "We found relatively few people to register. . . Even the 16-year-olds were pre-registered.  But there was a big emphasis on the need to VOTE and so it was good that there were the 3 of us in the crowd to offer it."

-Two members of the Voter Registration Committee set up a table at the Town of Amherst First Day event on the Amherst Town Common.  It was a very hot evening on August 28th!  We enjoyed chatting with people who came by our table especially one young fellow of 11 years old who says he is ready to pre-register to vote the day he turns 16.  We were inspired!

-Amherst League member Barbara Pearson, who is also on the Pioneer Valley Community Action Head Start

Tabling at Head Start!

Policy Council, was able to combine both activities this fall.  Barbara and Emmalie Dropkin, a UMass graduate student, teamed up to cover the parent Open Houses at Community Action's 11 Head Start sites from Greenfield to Westfield.  It's encouraging to learn from their experience that most of the Head Start parents (and staff) are already registered.  Still, the two submitted around a dozen new forms to various Town Clerks, gave out a stack of "register online to vote" cards, explained the ballot questions, and in general answered enough questions and concerns around voting that we will try to repeat it.   

       

-Members Joan Burgess, Eva Cashdan, Brenda and Tom Davies, Barbara Ford, Phyllis Lehrer, Adrienne Terrizzi and Kathy Vorwerk were on hand for the annual three hour, ½ mile long Amherst Block Party on September 20.      

 

 

 

Phyllis L. and Adrienne T.

 

Eva C and Surinder Mehta

 

T hey registered voters, offered membership applications and League materials, and provided informational

handouts both on LWVMA's stands on the three State ballot questions, and on the non-binding questions to appear on ballots in Amherst and some other Western Mass. communities. (The October e-bulletin will provide more information on the non-binding questions.)

 

-Here's one of the upcoming Voter Registration events.  Stay tuned for more!

 

- September 25 at the Jones Library Atrium for National Voter Registration Day.  Stop by and say hello anytime between 4pm and 6pm!

 

If you wish to participate in the Voter Registration Committee, please contact Nancy DiMattio.

 

-Nancy DiMattio, with contributions from Barbara Pearson  and Adrienne Terrizzi. 

LWV Plans Voter Registration at Amherst Regional High School, October 4

One of the caucus sessions that I attended at the LWV National Convention in Chicago this past summer was on registering high school students to vote.  The presenting leagues were from LA and Michigan; the registration programs were for districts including high schools with thousands of students.  I sat there and thought to myself, if those leagues could pull registration off in multiple huge high schools, certainly Amherst could make it happen in ARHS with just around 1000 students.  

 

Sure enough, we can.  On October 4th every senior advisory will talk about the importance of voting.  Students will be handed the "How to Register to Vote" postcards and given a few minutes to register, using either their phones or a school computer.  I would like to thank Assistant Principal Talib Sadiq for helping to make this happen, the ARHS librarians who are happy to assist with voter registration, and LWV Amherst members Nancy DiMattio and Liz Larson for helping to gather the necessary text.

   

-Rebecca Fricke

News from the September League Leader Update

There's more information available about LWVMA's positions on the State Ballot Questions.  As given here before, information about LWVMA's stands and reasons for taking its stands can be read here. You can also access "Resources for Ballot Question Information," which provides names and links to organizations which campaign for and against each ballot question, This can be most easily accessed by accessing the September League Leader Update. Click here to go to newsletters, then scroll to the September issue and on page 5, at the top of the page, click on "Resources for ballot question information." That will take you to the pdf with the information. More accessible are the "Guidelines for ballot question forums and advocacy": click here. 

 

LWVMA has moved. New address: 90 Canal St., Suite 414, Boston, MA 02114. Telephone 857-452-1715. Email still lwvma@lwvma.org

 

LWVMA is working on an updated Voters Guide, incorporating the results of the primary election. The new version will be available here on Wednesday, October 10.