TURNING out the youth vote could have a decisive effect on the 2008 election. More than any other group, we will suffer the consequences of the misguided policies of the last seven-and-a-half years. If we elect John McCain, who blusters about spending 100 years in Iraq if necessary and jokes about bombing Iran, our generation will be the one on the hook to fill the rosters and the body bags. Unfortunately, young people in this state, and young people at this University, have not played the role that they should in the democratic process. We need that to change.
The first thing to do is for students who are willing to change their residence to Charlottesville or Albemarle County to reregister here if they are currently registered elsewhere. It is much more likely that you'll vote if you can do so at a local precinct than if you have to mail an absentee ballot request, fill out the ballot when it comes, and return it on time. For students who have never voted, you need to get registered and get on board.
If you want to take matters into your own hands, registration forms can be easily downloaded online at the Web site of the Virginia Board of Elections. If not, you can wait for the registration drives that will be put on in Charlottesville by University student organizations and potentially by some of the political campaigns.
In my discussions with students as I canvassed for Barack Obama before the Virginia Democratic primary this past February, I encountered a huge number who would have voted but hadn't sent in an absentee ballot request. Many students didn't understand that an absentee ballot request was even necessary if they had registered somewhere else in Virginia. Similar forgetfulness almost surely hurt turnout in previous election cycles.
The University of Virginia has approximately 21,000 students. In the five precincts in which most students live -- Venable Elementary School, Jefferson Park, Alumni Hall, University Hall and East Ivy -- a total of 6,856 votes were cast in the 2004 Presidential election. Keep in mind that there are thousands of non-students in these precincts who doubtless make up a significant portion of the total vote.
The Alumni Hall and University Hall districts, which are the only precincts populated primarily by students, recorded 1,928 total votes in the 2004 election. These precincts include the votes of students in the Alderman Road dorms, the McCormick Road dorms, the Lawn and the Range, Brown College, Lambeth, most of Gooch-Dillard and Hereford College, many of the fraternities and other student neighborhoods. The 1,928 total votes is a small percentage of the total residents of all these places. Of course many students likely voted absentee, but my recent canvassing experience suggests to me that most students did not vote.
Besides increasing student voter participation, if more students were registered to vote locally students would have a much greater voice in city politics. There were about thirty percent more students at the University than voters in the city of Charlottesville in 2004. While an agreement from the 1980s places a large portion of students in on-campus housing in Albemarle County, off-campus neighborhoods near the University are within city limits and would impact city elections. With such low participation in City Council elections, a mobilized student base could easily get students, or candidates who speak to students' interests, elected to the City Council.
Unfortunately, in competitive city elections in 2007 less than 300 voters cast ballots at Alumni Hall. When I voted I didn't see a single other young person who could have been a University student. Dave Norris, Charlottesville's mayor, told me he would welcome more student participation and that he tried hard to mobilize students in his campaign. But city politicians will not be the ones to take the burden of increasing student participation on their shoulders. The student body here will need to do that itself.
Students who do consider reregistering in Charlottesville should make sure they are willing to become residents of Virginia. But unless there is a compelling reason not to, such as the need to maintain out-of-state residence for scholarships, it makes sense to reregister in Charlottesville to make sure your vote is counted. For too long student voices have been marginalized in politics at every level. But the issues at stake this year are too important for us to continue to be silenced by our own apathy.
Andrew Winerman's column appears Thursdays in the Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at awinerman@cavalierdaily.com?.
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