Collect Ranked Choice Voting Signatures
Voter Choice for Massachusetts, the Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) campaign, is working on the required second round of signatures needed to get an RCV ballot question on the November ballot. The effort needs 13,374 valid signatures (not from people who signed petitions in the fall) by June 17.
If you want to safely gather signatures from your friends and neighbors, Voter Choice is offering a virtual training session
exclusively for League members. Please
register now for this training for League members on
Thursday, May 7, at 2 p.m. Your help is important!
Voter Choice is asking voters to pledge to sign the RCV petition and will make sure those who sign are sent a petition by mail or online as soon as petitions become available
May 6. Pledge to sign the RCV petition by completing
this form, and please share on Facebook and via email.
Immigrants' Day May 7
Join Jen Muroff, LWVMA immigration specialist, at MIRA’s annual Immigrants’ Day
Thursday, May 7, 11 a.m.- 12:30 p.m. via Zoom videoconference.
RSVP here.
Our immigrant neighbors are disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Show legislators that we support swift, effective measures for an equitable and inclusive COVID-19 response, as well as movement on longstanding priorities such as the Safe Communities Act. Send an email to your own Senator and Representative urging them to
register at this link. Share this event with friends via the
Facebook event.
Moderator Training Webinar
LWVMA is offering moderator training through a webinar
Monday, May 11, at 1 p.m. We will have time for questions and will be coordinating small group follow-up sessions for role playing to get more comfortable with the rules. Please
register here.
The webinar, presented by Jo-Ann Berry and Elizabeth Foster-Nolan, is open to anyone who would like to be trained as a moderator or would like a refresher on the rules and learn about moderating a forum in the era of Zoom. It will be recorded and available later on the LWVMA website.
Urge Legislature to Revise Election Practices
Please email your Senator and Representative and urge them to make needed changes in the way Massachusetts conducts elections before the Sept. 1 primary election and Nov. 3 general election. While we all hope the COVID-19 virus will have abated by fall, we need to plan to conduct our elections as if it will not. That particularly means greatly expanded vote by mail outreach while continuing to offer in-person voting that is safe for voters and poll workers.
LWVMA and our Election Modernization Coalition partners will file a bill in the legislature shortly to address these issues based on the recommendations in a Coalition
letter to the legislature. In the meantime, ask for general support of such reforms.
LWVUS offers these
talking points on the League strategy of making voting more flexible and providing options such as vote by mail for voters.
Help with Census 2020
The 2020 Census count and the outreach to ensure a complete count in Massachusetts continues. You can help by volunteering to phone bank to increase the count. MassCounts will conduct phone banks through the end of June every Tuesday from 11 a.m.-1 p.m., Wednesday from 5-7 p.m., Thursday from 5-7 p.m., and Saturday from 1-3 p.m. to call residents of census tracts with the lowest self-response rates. You can
sign up to join a virtual phone bank. You'll need a computer and a cell phone; a 15-20-minute training and a script are provided. Please note you need to sign up for each day you would like to phone bank.
Ask Congress to Fund Election Needs
LWVUS is working to ensure elections and equality are prioritized as Congress drafts stimulus bills for COVID relief. The three provisions we are asking for are:
- Ensure that $4 billion in election funding is included to help states to make the remaining primaries and the November general election safe for all to participate.
- Ensure that all families and individuals receive aid from the government, regardless of their immigration or tax status.
- Ensure that Washington D.C. is treated like a state and not a territory in funding distribution.
You can help ensure these provisions are included in the next relief package by taking action with this LWVUS
action alert and sharing our
memo to Congress.
Participate in a Webinar
Many of our members are enjoying participating in webinars while sheltering at home. Consider these webinars offered by LWVMA in the next month:
100th Anniversary Series
- Dr. Carolyn Jefferson-Jenkins, president of the national LWV from 1998 to 2002, the only African-American woman to head the League. Wednesday, May 6, 7 p.m. Register here.
- Barbara Berenson, After Suffrage: The Campaign for the Equal Rights Amendment, 1920 – 2020, Tuesday, June 2, 7 p.m. Register here.
Raising Civic Engagement Among Younger People
- Nancy Thomas, Director, Institute for Democracy & Higher Education, Tufts University, Thursday, May 21, 4 p.m. Register here.
New England Regional League Conference
- Voter engagement panel with Yanna Krupnikov, Maine Immigrants' Rights Coalition Executive Director Mufalo Chitam, and New Hampshire state senator Melanie Levesque, Monday, May 11, 2 p.m. Register here.
- How Leagues are handling the pandemic and the challenges for elections, Monday, May 18, at 2 p.m. Register here.
