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Civic Engagement Web Presentation
The Internet and Voting Decisions
What we hope you’ll get out of this series of slides
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Find out how to verify that you’re registered to vote
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Print a sample ballot
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Learn some of the best places to get information on candidates and issues
While this series provides many ways to get information on candidates and issues, you should feel free to just use the resources that best fit your interests. It is not necessary to use all of these options to become a more informed voter.
1. Electronic version of the voter’s pamphlet
A great source of information on what you’ll find on your ballot is from Secretary of State’s website. As the Chief Elections Officer for the State of Washington, the Secretary of State is home to the central voter database, where citizen initiative petitions are filed and where candidates file to run for office.
A useful tool available on the site is an electronic version of the voter’s guide. This is the same guide that you would normally receive in the mail.
http://www.secstate.wa.gov/elections
2. Verify that you are registered and print your sample ballot
While the Secretary of State is the Chief Elections Officer for the State of Washington, it is at the county level that elections are administered.
King County Elections has an outstanding web tool for verifying your registration and running a sample ballot that exclusively shows what you’ll see on your ballot.
Visit the King County Elections and click on the red star that says “Your Voter Guide”.
Enter your name and address or name and birthday and click that button at the bottom of the page that says “Crate My Guide”.
Once submitted you will receive back whether or not your registered to vote and, if your are, the races that your are eligible to vote in. The list of eligible races also has clickable links to information on the candidates and issues you can voter on.
http://www.metrokc.gov/elections
3. Some things to think about when evaluating candidates
Who paid for the poll? Was the poll affected by an important event? What questions were asked? Were they fair? Who was interviewed? How many people were interviewed? How many "Undecideds"? How old are the results? What was the geographic scope of the poll?
Endorsements provide clues to what a candidate thinks is important. Some organizations representing interest groups (business, the environment, labor, older Americans, etc.) go through people's votes on bills and rate them on how closely they match one group's point of view. These ratings can be helpful, but they can be misleading. Never take them as the final word. Check the organization's reputation. Can they be trusted? What is the group's bias?
Where do the candidates get the money to pay for their campaigns? Do they use their own money? Did they get money from a few rich people or did they get money from many people giving small amounts? Get money from Political Action Committees? (PACs, as they are known, are groups formed to raise and distribute money to candidates and issues.) This information is courtesy of the League of Women Voters Polling
Groups
Examine the candidate's campaign finances
4. Profiles of City Council Candidates
The Seattle Ethics and Elections Commission administers the City's Code of Ethics and the Elections Campaign Code, publishes the City's voters' pamphlets, and investigates certain complaints of improper governmental action under the City's whistleblower protection ordinance.
Their site provides more detailed information on candidates running for city council
and information on amendments to the city charter that may appear on your ballot.
http://www2.ci.seattle.wa.us/ethics/votersguide.asp
5. Doing a Web Search on a candidate
Another great way to learn more about a candidate running for office is to do an internet search through a search engine (like Goggle, Yahoo or MSN) using the candidate’s name and, if the candidate has a common name, the jurisdiction they’re running in (i.e. Joe Smith Seattle).
Once you run the search you’ll likely get back a host of references and links to the
candidate including:
- The candidate’s campaign website (more on that later)
- If a current office holder, their official government website
- News articles about the candidate
- Blog posts about the candidate (From Wikipedia: A blog is a website where entries
are written in chronological order. The ability for readers to leave comments in an
interactive format is also part of many blogs). It’s important to note that while there
are highly respected and informative blogs, others can contain very biased or false
information about a candidate or issue. - Mentions about the candidate on other websites
6. Organizations that evaluate Candidates and Issues
There are several organizations in our community that evaluate candidates and issues. One, of course, is the Municipal League of King County and another is the League of Women Voters.
The Municipal League evaluates both candidates and issues in a nonpartisan
framework that uses “good government” as its guiding principal. Its candidate evaluations are like a job interview that attempt to determine if a candidate would be a good office holder. The ratings are based on four criteria of involvement, effectiveness, character and knowledge and run from “not qualified” to the coveted “outstanding”.
The League of Women Voter’s site, washingtonvoter.org, has ballot recommendations and a great voters toolkit.
http://munileague.org/cec/2007
http://www.washingtonvoter.org
7. Organizations that evaluate Candidates and Issues
Other civics sites include the local League of Women of Voter’s site where they have ballot measure recommendations and Project Smart Vote, a nonpartisan group which tracks voting records of members of the U.S. congress and some local office holders.
http://www.seattlelwv.org/general2007
8. Interest Groups that Endorse Candidates
Issues groups are another source of information on candidates that can be a great
shortcut to determining if you want to support a candidate or not. Most well established issues groups do research, tack voting records of office holders and conduct endorsements interviews to make endorsements or recommendations on people running for office that the group thinks will be the best office holder on their particular issue. So check with your favorite issues group to see if they have recommendations on candidates or issues.
http://cascade.sierraclub.org/endorsements/2007
http://www.washingtonmainstream.org/endorsements.aspx
9. Candidate Websites
Probably one of the most common websites to go to for information is the candidate’s
website. If you haven’t been to one before, here are some particular areas of the site
to look at:
- Biography or About Me: Outlines the Candidate’s education, work experience,
and personal background. - Issues: Outlines the major policy positions of the candidates or areas of public
policy of particular interest to the candidate - Endorsements: Probably one of the most common shortcuts people use in
making a decision of who to voter for, candidate endorsements can come from
individuals, issue and other organizations, unions, political parties, newspapers
and former and current elected officials.
9. Newspaper Editorials/Endorsements
Newspaper endorsements can be one of the toughest endorsements to get. Editorial
boards generally check out the background of a candidate, bring them in for an interview
and often ask tough questions. It’s important to remember that editorial boards of
newspapers can lean to the right or the left and their endorsements may reflect that.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/
10. Public Disclosure Commission
The Public Disclosure Commission is the state agency that candidate and ballot
measure campaigns report their fundraising and expenditures to. If you’re interested
in seeing where a candidate get his or her money or how they send their campaign
funds – check out the PDC’s website.
Thank you!
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