As early voting continues, those hoping to mobilize voters of all stripes are working hard to knock on doors and get Ohioans to the polls.

Ohio Voice works on civic engagement throughout the year, but with presidential elections, a tumultuous U.S. Senate race and a ballot initiative to change the state’s redistricting process, this year is a “historic” election year, according to Ohio Voice co-director James Hayes.

Hayes’ group is organizing events and working with the Ohio Voting Rights Coalition before and during Election Day to make sure voters have what they need. Many of the Ohio Voice groups focus on Black voters, keeping the groups informed about issues and candidates.

“There is no substitute for person-to-person conversations,” Hayes said. “People need to talk to voters; It requires intention.”

The poll covered many issues, but Issue 1’s redistricting reform emerged as part of conversations with voters about the impact of politics on the things that matter to them.

Issue 1 would reform Ohio’s redistricting process by creating a citizens’ redistricting commission of five Republicans, five Democrats and five independents who would be selected by a bipartisan judicial panel to draw statehouse and congressional maps that determine voting districts throughout the state.

The ballot initiative would replace the current Ohio Redistricting Commission, which is comprised of politicians who repeatedly produced unconstitutionally gerrymandered maps in 2021 and 2022.

“Gerrymandering and redistricting may not be the first issues that voters think about, but you realize that things like housing, environmental issues and the economy are all affected,” Hayes said.

Young Latin Network

Voter education is important in any election, but it can be especially important when it comes to issues about which voters are poorly informed.

“Gerrymandering doesn’t translate very well into Spanish,” said Selina Pagan, executive director of the Young Latino Network, an outreach organization with roots in Northeast Ohio since 2002.

Pagan said the group plans to offer bilingual information on Issue 1 for educational purposes for voters, but also said the summary language adopted by the Ohio Voting Board was “very confusing” and, even more importantly, in a different language than the language in which it was published. It was written complete with “jargon” that cannot be translated.

“The pronunciation of Spanish definitely influences someone who doesn’t have context to vote no,” Pagan said.

In addition to educating voters about Issue 1, Pagan said YLN worked to ensure voters registered on time, made voters aware of ways to vote by mail, and knocked on more than 5,000 doors. Volunteers in the network spoke to more than 900 people, focusing specifically on the city of Cleveland.

“The (Latino) community previously did not have a political home and an organizing body to launch these types of voter engagement efforts,” Pagan told the Capital Journal. “We’re building this thing from the ground up and we’re going to make a splash this year.”

The group collected more than 1,500 cards pledging a plan to vote in the 2024 general election and used phone banking and campaigns to provide information about polling places and other nonpartisan information.

Now that the election is less than two weeks away, Pagan said the group is working to inform voters about the issues that matter most to the Latino community, specifically, and how races like the Ohio U.S. Senate seat and the Ohio Supreme Court races are playing out. Local effects.

“We want to challenge our community to think more tactically,” Pagan said. “This means creating spaces for us to talk about how these positions impact our daily lives.”

Children’s Issues

Child care, hunger initiatives and education advocates in the state are communicating with parents and others affected by legislative and congressional actions on these issues.

Everything from individual candidates in voter districts to the overall redistricting reform proposed in Issue 1 could affect public and private education funding, how student debt for school breakfast and lunch is handled, and changes to the state’s child care system.

“We know there is a need for child care, we know there is a need to pay child care workers more, we know there is a need for more parents to be able to afford child care,” said Kelly Vyzral, senior health policy associate. For the Ohio Children’s Defense Fund.

Vyzral said the changes made in Issue 1 could make a difference in resource allocation in the state.

“Legislative representation and how these districts are drawn reflect the voices that are being heard,” Vyzral said. “You may not have a voice to speak out on fair school funding, and in different parts of the state, that’s a big problem.”

To help voters understand where Statehouse candidates stand on issues like child care and education, the nonprofit organization Ohio Kids First created a voter guideContains responses to the survey sent to each candidate for Ohio House and Senate seats.

“It is critical to elect leaders who will put the needs of Ohio children front and center in our state legislature,” Rachel Selby, executive director of Ohio Kids First, said in a statement announcing the voter guide. “From the child care crisis to quality early learning, from access to health care to early intervention, Ohio’s children and families face significant challenges and needs that are often overlooked.”

The voter guide includes answers from 45 candidates for Ohio House seats and six of the Ohio Senate candidates to questions about their reasons for running, child care as a workforce issue, barriers to affordable child care options, kindergarten readiness, and infant and maternal mortality.

disabled people

While many groups are making progress with plans to reach voters in the weeks before the general election, voters with disabilities have suffered a setback that they say could affect their ability to vote.

“They are citizens, they have the right to vote,” said Than Johnson, former president of the Ohio Supplier Resources Association and former CEO of Champaign Residential Services, Inc., an Urbana-based provider of services for the developmentally disabled.

Disabled voter advocates in the state revolted when Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose issued an order stating that those distributing ballots on behalf of another person must sign an “attestation” form pledging that they did not violate state law when distributing ballots. for another person.

The case is back a federal lawsuit A lawsuit filed in 2023 by the League of Women Voters of Ohio featured a disability rights advocate who said Ohio’s newly changed voter ID law restricted who could return absentee ballots, thus violating federal law.

For most Ohioans with disabilities, caregivers are “basically fake parents,” according to Johnson, and so they are the best people to help their votes count.

“A lot of (Ohioans with disabilities) are pretty consistent, and caregivers should have the right to take them to the vote,” Johnson said. “To me, the primary support for these individuals is the caregivers.”

The court challenge alleged that the extra step of filling out a form placed restrictions on voting, including regulating when ballots could be dropped off (within election hours boards), cutting off the ability of those dropping off ballots on behalf of others to use the drop-off feature. Boxes for this purpose.

In this case the federal judge Ohio residents with disabilities allowed to draft a person of their choice Deciding that the Voting Rights Act gave these voters this right, he demanded that they return their absentee ballots.

After this case was decided, LaRose issued the directive requiring deliverers to: absentee ballots Fill out the consent forms.

inside full of drama state supreme court case challenging this directive, Ohio Supreme Court chose not to rule It decided whether LaRose’s directive violated state law and instead ruled that the court challenge had not been filed in time for them to decide.

“What concerns me is that we have what I would consider a restriction on the ability of these individuals to have the right to vote,” Johnson said. “But there’s (the Ohio Supreme Court decision) at the very end of the process, which is a decision we can’t help with.”

Absentee ballots must be delivered to local election boards by the end of business on October 29. Early voting in Ohio continues through November 3.