Role and Importance Of Poll Greeters

Join us for another Democratic Network Educational Forum discussion on Voter Empowerment and Election Protection, at 10:45am this Sat., October 13th, at the John & Judy Gay Library in McKinney. The Forum this month will provide training on the role and importance of poll greeters, including what we all can do to protect voters' rights. LOTS of poll greeters will be needed so ask your friends to attend this Forum presentation. There will also be additional discussion about the duties of poll watchers. (John & Judy Gay Library - 6861 El Dorado Parkway - Map)

Remember 2000? Hanging chads, voter suppression, overwhelming confusion and voting machines that may - or may not - have counted the votes as they were cast. There were critical failures at many key points along the way that resulted in a stolen election and eight long years of regret. 

Today, the King Street Patriots, Tea Party groups and conservative activists of all stripes are recruiting and training followers to "True the Vote" in ways that are clearly designed to intimidate legitimate voters and suppress votes from ethnic and religious minorities, young people and other targeted populations. On the heels of months of voter photo I.D. court fights, deputy voter registrar court fights, redistricting court fights, plus a last minute purge of dead voters who are not dead, confusion and errors in the election process are virtually guaranteed, and we still have concerns about those machines.

Saturday October 13, 2012

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Being informed about these intimidation tactics and failure points before the first votes are cast allows you to defend vulnerable voters and protect the interests of candidates you support. You'll able to share important information with your network and identify potential issues anywhere and everywhere you see them.

The program will be held at the John & Judy Gay Library in McKinney, 6861 El Dorado Parkway, just east of Alma. It's centrally located in the county and offers plenty of room, so please encourage Democratic friends and neighbors to come with you. Join us for coffee and breakfast goodies at 10:45 am and the program will get started at 11:00 am. We'll wrap up by 1 pm and those who care to continue the discussion can adjourn to a nearby restaurant for lunch.

As always, we invite your input on topics, speakers, format and other options - and encourage you to get involved in growing our network. We'll have sign-up and comment sheets at the event, but if you aren't able to attend, please e-mail us at info@collindems.net, or call (469) 713-2031 to leave a voice message.

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Democratic Network Educational Forum

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VP Debate Watch

We invite you to get "fired up and ready to go" for the rest of the campaign Thursday evening, October 11th by attending a Debate Watch at Rugby House Pub, in north west Plano ~ 8604 Preston Rd., Suite 100, Plano, Tx 75024. (map)

Come watch the October 11th VP debate between Vice President Joe Biden and Congressman Paul Ryan with your Democratic friends and neighbors. The debate telecast starts a 8:00pm, but you are welcome to come early to order drinks and food and chat with your friends and neighbors.

This 90-minute debate, moderated by ABC News Chief Foreign Correspondent, Martha Raddatz, telecast from Centre College in Danville, Kentucky, will be broken up into nine 10-minute segments focused on Foreign and Domestic Policy.

The Texas Democratic Women of Collin County, Democratic Network, Democratic Blog News, Plano Drinking Liberally and McKinney Living Liberally are co-sponsors of this debate watch event at Rugby House Pub media room. This debate watch event is in lieu of the regular Plano Drinking Liberally meeting that would be on the 12th and the McKinney Living Liberally meeting that would be on the 11th.   Debate schedule posted below the more jump...

Register To Vote

by Michael Handley

Today, October 9, 2012, is the deadline to be registered to vote in the 2012 Texas General Election.  Are you registered to vote? Even if you think you are registered you should double check your registration status RIGHT NOW, because your registration could have been suspended or completely purged.

To vote early, starting Monday, October 22, 2012, or on Election Day, November 6th, you must be registered to vote or have mailed your new (or change of address) voter registration form to the election office for the county in which you currently reside so that it is postmarked before 11:59pm, October 9, 2012.

I have worked every election as Early Voting and Election Day Election Clerk, and more recently Alternate Judge, for the last ten years.  In the last two hours of every November Election Day too many last minute voters, who may have waited in a line for up to an hour, check in to vote only find they are not registered. Waiting until 5:00pm on Election Day, Tuesday, November 6, 2012 to discover a problem with your registration status is too late - if you check your registration status NOW and find a problem, you can fix it.

My polling place always calls the county election office to ask them to search their records to determine why a person who thinks they are registered vote is not on the polling place list of registered voters. Sometimes the election office finds that a properly registered voter is not on the polling place list of voters due to a clerical error, in which case the person can vote a regular ballot.  More often, would-be voters not found in the polling place list of voters are not properly registered and their only option is to vote a provisional ballot, as provided under the federal Help America to Vote Act.

There are several typical reasons would-be voters find they are not registered. Top on the list of reasons is that people think they were automatically registered when they changed, renewed or applied for their Texas driver's license at the Department of Motor Vehicles office - but that DMV voter registration did not occur. 

As required by the federal National Voter Registration Act of 1993, better known as the ‘Motor Voter’ law, Texas DMV workers are suppose to ask everyone they process if they want to register to vote or to update their registration information. If the client replies yes, state employees ask eligibility questions and enter that information directly into their computers.

Software processes the registrant’s information — name, age, address, citizenship, etc. — and automatically prepares a voter registration application with all the registrant’s identifying information. The DMV employee then ask the registrant to review the application for correctness, and sign it using a pen. The voter registration application is then scanned, where the signature is electronically captured as an electronic image file. That image file is then combined with the voter’s other digitized information and electronically sent to election offices where the application is processed. If all the application information is verified, the registrant is added to the voter registration data base in the county where they reside and to the Texas Secretary of State's statewide TEAM voter registration data base. 

Other common reasons people may find they are not registered in this election include:

• If you haven't voted in the last two federal elections, you may no longer be registered to vote.
• If you did not receive a yellow 2012-13 Voter Registration Card (VRC), you may no longer be registered to vote.
• If you moved, but you did not go to your county's election registration office to file a voter registration form for your current residence, you may no longer be registered to vote.