Working with our local and statewide partners, we have used our research and advocacy strengths to win significant policy changes. These changes have strengthened North Carolina’s democracy and put voters more in control of elections.

 

 

During the last quarter of 2009, Democracy NC:

• Collected hundreds of post cards in support of the Fair Elections Now Act (FENA), from all across the state.
• Conducted extensive GOTV work. We produced or helped with voter guides, printed and distributed flyers with early voting and same day registration info, organized candidate forums, phone banked newly registered voters and helped with rides to the polls.
• Conducted GOTV trainings that focused on strategy and tactics for municipal races.
  
• Distributed tens of thousands of Souls to the Polls flyers to help increase turn-out in 2009.
• Made presentations to numerous groups on Voter-Owned Elections, Youth Pre-Registration, the Census, Democracy Summer and 2010 Souls to the Polls efforts.
• Distributed Pre-Registration fliers at youth assemblies; spoke to high school classes on Pre-Registration; and scheduled voter registrations for January when the new law took affect.
• Worked in conjunction with partners inside and outside the educational system to take other steps to help ease the upcoming implementtion of the new Youth Pre-Registration law.
• Held coalition meetings in our local coalition areas, with the goal of expanding these local groups to include even more partners.
• Set the stage for 2010 Census coalitions in all of our local areas.
• Wrote op-ed pieces in support of youth civic engagement and Voter-Owned Elections.
• Spoke to students at NC Central, UNC-CH, UNC Charlotte, East Carolina and Fayetteville State about Democracy Summer opportunities.
• Launched a new website and mounted e-advocacy efforts in support of the Fair Elections Now Act.
• Provided the State Board of Elections with exhibits and testimony during its 5-day hearing to examine evidence regarding for NC Governor Mike Easley’s misuse of gifts and campaign funds.
• Led the charge to get NC members of Congress to become co-sponsors of FENA, which would create a public financing option for candidates for Congress. NC Congressional Reps. Miller, Price, Kissell and Watt have now joined more than 100 Representatives as co-sponsors and we continue to encourage Reps. Etheridge, Shuler, Butterfield and Coble to join them.
• Continued work that advanced bills for expanding Council of State and local public financing in the 2010 session and worked with the NC Coalition for Lobby and Government Reform on a package of ethics bills.
• Enjoyed the success of  the Chapel Hill public financing pilot and met with government officials to explore ways to refine and improve the program.
• Participated in a coalition focusing on the voting rights of misdemeanants and former felons. The coalition held meetings with representatives of the NC Sheriffs’ Association, Department of Corrections and the Board of Elections to explore ways to reach eligible voters in jails and to educate former felons about their rights.
• Assisted the NAACP Legal Defense Fund in successfully defending two dozen students from Elizabeth City State University whose registrations were challenged by two losing candidates.
• Signed on to an amicus brief to challenge the burdensome requirements faced by new political parties to have their candidates appear on the NC ballot.  

 

In the 3rd Quarter of 2009, we:

• Documented how the NC Democratic Party was used as a conduit for earmarked contributions to the Mike Easley Committee. Our efforts prompted further investigation by the State Board of Elections and payment of penalties by the party.
• Helped local coalitions implement nonpartisan voter education and “get out the vote” efforts in Charlotte, Winston-Salem, Fayetteville, Greensboro, and Greenville, thanks to the leadership of our organizers. We produced voter guides, held forums, distributed literature, and taught more young leaders about the power of grassroots politics.
• Sponsored forums and educated voters about Chapel Hill’s new “Voter Owned” public financing program. The two candidates who qualified for program grants both won election, and both praised the program for letting them focus on issues rather than fundraising.
• Begun organizing NC contributors into “Campaign Donors for Campaign Reform.” These donors have taken the lead in convincing lawmakers like US Reps Brad Miller and David Price to co-sponsor the Federal Elections Now Act. This legislation offers Congressional candidates a public financing alternative similar to our state Voter-Owned Elections programs.
• Passed a bill, with the help of our allies, through the state Senate that would add the office of Treasurer to the Council of State public financing program. We’re now laying the groundwork to add more offices, as well as win new ethics and campaign finance regulations, in 2010.
• Engaged more young people in grassroots politics through several on-going initiatives. We’re recruiting the next class of 10 Democracy Summer interns for intensive organizing in five cities. We’re also working with educators, students and election officials to implement a new law that encourages voter registration with enhanced civics education in the tenth grade, a law we championed. And earlier this month, we teamed up with the NAACP to help students at Elizabeth City State University defeat a legal challenge to their right to vote locally.
• Involved young people in our initiative to prevent the undercount of people in low-income communities during the 2010 census. An undercount will rob a community of government funds ($1,500 per person) and political power. Our project is organizing churches, students and civic groups into full-count efforts in at least 12 target counties.
• Released research reports that show the link between a corrupt campaign finance system and skewed public policies involving health care, energy and taxes.
• Generated over 1,000 phone calls, 500 emails and 415 hand-written postcards directed to NC legislators in support of Voter-Owned Elections.
• Spoken to nearly 50 civic groups and community organizations about our work.
• Met with over 80 Democracy Advocates, community leaders and elected officials to gain support for election reform and voting rights.
• Completed research projects that focused on campaign contributions from political appointees and developed maps of youth-service organizations in five NC counties to help us implement the new Pre-Registration law for 16-17 olds in NC.
• Helped turnout over 120 advocates from all over NC for the largest-ever Voter-Owned Elections Lobby Day in Raleigh. Advocates, interns and our staff met with over 50 legislators to discuss pending legislation.
• Teamed up with NC WARN and a coalition of environmental groups to develop a citizen training related to Duke Energy’s request for a substantial rate increase. We presented a power analysis about the sources of the utility’s clout (including campaign money) and the ways people have successfully challenged that power. We conducted training in three cities for citizens interested in attending public hearings on the rate request held by the NC Utilities Commission.

Between January 2008 and June 2009, we:

• Successfully advocated for Youth Pre-Registration legislation that allows 16- and 17 year olds to pre-register to vote as part of the high school civics curriculum in preparation for the day they come of voting age.

• Undertook an 11-month campaign to expand the availability of Early Voting sites, statewide and in 35 targeted counties, an effort that helped inspire more than 2 million North Carolinians voting early.

• Promoted Early Voting and Same-Day Registration via media and distribution of 600,000 flyers, voter rights pamphlets and statewide and local voter guides.

• Conducted nearly 50 voter registration/GOTV trainings for groups ranging from the Girl Scouts to the Association of Apartment Owners.

• Led the development of voter registration/GOTV coalitions in Guilford, Mecklenburg, Pitt, and Cumberland counties while supporting other GOTV efforts by partners in Winston-Salem, Durham, Wake and eight Sandhills region counties.

• Teamed up with the NC NAACP, General Baptists, AME Zion and 300 local churches to implement Souls to the Polls, an initiative our research shows made Sunday the most intensive voting day of the 2008 election.

• Created a new website called www.2008ElectionConnection.com that featured the Who, What, How, When and Where of voting and voting rights in NC.

• Helped design the provisions of a new local public financing program for Chapel Hill, working closely with the town’s attorney and council committee and the State Board of Elections.

• Advocated for the expansion of local public campaign financing as an option for other cities during the 2009 General Assembly.

• Promoted participation in NC’s Council of State public financing program and distributed 300,000 flyers that educated people on how to support the judicial program using the $3 N.C. Public Campaign Fund check-off option on the state tax forms.

• Grew Campaign Donors for Campaign Reform, a group of advocates for public financing that includes many large donors to political campaigns in our state.

• Monitored suspicious election-related activity, filed complaints when warranted, fielded hundreds of hot-line calls on a toll-free line, and worked with multiple national voter protection groups.

• Trained a diverse group of 10 young organizers through our life-changing, skills-building Democracy Summer program.

• Educated the public by appearing in more than 200 news stories and supplying our partners and the media with a steady stream of information about voting procedures and money in politics.

• Spearheaded a successful effort to extend the Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) pilot program for local governments for three years and helped design the guidelines and evaluation standards for using IRV.

• Helped our partners at the Coalition for Lobbying & Government Reform prevent the weakening of the relatively new ethics and lobbying law in North Carolina.

• Produced research products analyzing such democracy-related topics as county-level (and in some cases, precinct-level) voter registration and voter turnout before and after the election; use of Early Voting and Same-Day Registration by race, gender, and age; and much more.