Voter Data Management NY State Electoral Gathering June 13,

Voter Engagement Cycle

Analyze - - plan

Political Context Analysis Analyze why issue matters to you Analyze your own capacity what does the community stand to gain? What might it lose? how does your organization fit in?

Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan Targeting The work After the election

Targeting For the election - trying to win? Geographic Demographic For organizational growth For availability and usability of data

The Path to Voter Lists Precinct Analysis Precinct data on targeted areas, voter propensity, demographics Target Voter Universe (# voters and # precincts)‏ Refined strategy based on capacity & resources Organization Assessment Strategic Targeting Understanding your region and base Voter analysis (eligibility, registration, participation levels)‏ Defined Targeted Areas Capacity Resources Preliminary goals for: number of precincts, volunteers, voter contacts

What is meant by Strategic Targeting Understanding your Region and Target Area Analysis of your Base Constituency in terms of your local or regional Power Equation –What is it now (levels of registration & turn out)‏ –What’s the potential (increasing registration & turn out)‏ Determining Where you can/want/need to build power –Geographic –Demographics –Voter Propensity

Strategic Targeting: Understanding Your Region and Base SCOPE Organizing Strategy focused in areas with high concentrations of members and high poverty rates. Other factors to consider Community Profile Ethnicity Income/ Poverty Levels Occupations Education Levels Welfare Recipients Types of Industry Incarceration Rates Linguistic Isolation Scale of Wages Age Housing Conditions Rent Pollution sites (power plants)‏

Where do you get planning counts? –Voter data consultants –Data vendors (eg –Voter tech tools (eg VAN / Voter Connect, CEL, Catalist)‏ What you can ask for (3 basic elements)‏ –Precincts in a targeted geography (political boundaries, cities, zip codes)‏ –Voter propensity (Likely, Occasional, New voters)‏ –Demographics A.Race: African American, Latino, Asian/Pacific Islander B.Age distribution: youth, middle aged, seniors C.Gender Requests can be broad or specific Precinct Analysis: Step 1 - Request Planning Counts

Precinct Analysis: Step 2 – Analyze the Counts PLANNING COUNTS HELP YOU 1.Identify a set Number of Precincts that you want to cover (mainly based on density)‏ 2. Prioritize precincts 3.Define your Voter Universe – number of voters combined 4.Inform and refine your overall strategy based on capacity and resources

Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan Targeting The work

People you can recruit and train to work are the real product What data are you using? How are you tracking it? Where are the bottlenecks? Getting it into data file Getting the data into your file

Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan Targeting The work After the election

After the election Evaluation by staff AND volunteers Renew contact with voters met oriented to your issues Evaluate your issues in light of what you learned GROW (we hope)

Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan Targeting The work After the election Do it all again, Better.

Targets Who are you going to talk to? How many will you talk to? How What tactics will you use to talk to each target group? When A specific date or date range. What cost? The resources needed to do this, in both $ and in people. Who’s responsible? The person or people accountable to the task. Voter Registration and Engagement Voter Education Voter Mobilization Post-election

Targets Who are you going to talk to? How many will you talk to? How What tactics will you use to talk to each target group? When A specific date or date range. What cost? The resources needed to do this, in both $ and in people Who’s responsible? The person or people accountable to the task. Data Management Field tools, Data entry, Skills needed, other support Voter Registration and Engagement Voter Education Voter Mobilization Post-election

DATA MANAGEMENT 1.What do you need to know in order to do this activity? 2.What information will you collect in the course of doing this activity? 3.Why is this information important?

 Field Tools: Walk / Call Lists, PDAs, predictive dialer / robo-calls, door hangers, etc.  Data Entry: bar code scanners, volunteers / staff do manual data entry, staff to manage/monitor quality of data  Skills Needed: create walk/call lists, set up voter engagement database, data entry training, field planning, analysis of data, etc.,  Other support: integration of voter data into organizational database, tech support, etc.

Targets Who are you going to talk to? How many will you talk to? How What tactics will you use to talk to each target group? When A specific date or date range. What cost? The resources needed to do this, in both $ and in people Who’s responsible? The person or people accountable to the task. Data Management Field tools, Data entry, Skills needed, other support Voter Registration and Engagement Voter Education Voter Mobilization Post-election

Voter Data Cycle

Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan Targeting The work After the election

targeting Assess demographics Assess voter behavior Assess political terrain Assess organizational capacity

Prepare voter contact database Develop voter contact data workflow Pull / Set up voter lists Merge voter lists with membership lists

Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan Targeting The Work After the election

Produce outputs for voter contact Develop phone/walksheets based on campaign needs Develop reports to assess progress/performance during campaign

Enter voter contacts into field database Using data entry tech and volunteers, get canvass data back into database Generate new phone/walksheets based on results of prior contacts

Post-election

Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan Targeting The Work After the election

ID Voter Contacts for follow-up

Store results of voter contact

Merge voter contacts into member list

Enhanced list Voter Data Member Data Enhanced List

It’s all about the Voter ID Number VoterIDFirst NameLast Name 198X65W32JonSmith 98398T0LJ7LaDonStewart MemberIDLastNameVoterID 21233Smith198X65W Stewart98398T0LJ7 Voter File Membership Database

Let’s take a gander at the VAN

Announcing the First Online Learning Site for Community Organizers Working on Voter Projects. Learn from the experiences of other organizers

PTP Power On Network Technology Information and Resource Sharing for Community Organizers

THANK YOU