Asian Journal: The Journal of the Filipino in America
May 10th, 2006
Asian-American Community Groups in Groundbreaking Effort to Increase Voting Participation
By Momar G. Visaya
Leaders of various Asian American organizations such as FASGI's Susan Dilkes (extreme left), SIPA's Gerlie Collado (third from left) and FASGI's Bernie Targa (extreme right) join APALC's Eugene Lee (fifth from left) and other community leaders at the press conference that discussed the launching of the 'Asian American Voter Project' last week. AJ Photo by Momar G. Visaya
LOS ANGELES - Nine community organizations - including the Filipino American Service Group, Inc. (FASGI) and Search to Involve Pilipino Americans (SIPA) -- announced last week a new project called the 'Asian American Voter Project,' a collaborative effort designed to increase Asian American voting participation in Los Angeles County during the June and November 2006 elections.
"This is a unique, ground-breaking project and I am glad the different Asian communities have joined together for this," Eugene Lee of the Asian Pacific American Legal Center (APALC) said. "We are conducting outreach to Cambodian, Chinese, Filipino. Japanese, Korean, South Asian and Vietnamese American voters."
The Asian Pacific American community constitutes almost 15% of California's population, yet this community only constitutes 6-8% of the population who votes each election because they face barriers to civic participation such as language, citizenship and low voter registration rates.
The organizations will conduct phone banking and send mailers to a list of over 15,000 infrequent voters who have consistent patterns of not voting. Infrequent voters are defined as voters who have voted less than two out of the last four elections, newly registered voters, and voters between ages 18 and 24.
"Medyo mahihirapan ang mga volunteers natin kasi ang apelyido ng ibang mga Pilipino ay parang Hispanic pero gagawin naming ang makakaya naming para mas maraming mga kababayan natin ang makaboto," shared
FASGI's Bernie Targa.
"Our message is that voting empowers our community, and that voting is easy," said Sharon Owyang, Executive Director of the Center for Asian Americans United for Self Empowerment (CAUSE). "We are encouraging
voters to vote so that politicians pay attention to the issues they care about.
FASGI's Executive Director Susan Dilkes shared her sentiment that "it is critical for us to speak to be heard" and that there is a need to "fill the gap."
"I am encouraging all our kababayans to use the power of text messaging to spread this news because this is a very important issue for all of us. We need everyone's support and participation. Ang boto ninyo ay lakas natin,'" Dilkes added.
Lee believes that this is the first non-partisan effort in Southern California to get-out-the-vote (GOTV) outreach to such a large number of infrequent Asian American voters in Los Angeles County. He further noted that political parties and issue-based campaigns ignore infrequent voters. Instead, they focus their attention on influencing
the decisions of frequent voters who typically turn out to vote.
The pattern has become cyclical. Because political and issue-based campaigns do not contact infrequent voters, they (the infrequent voters) are not motivated to go to the polls, and they remain in the category of voters that political campaigns ignore. This cycle gets repeated election after election, leaving infrequent voters out of the political process.
"Our organizations will help break this cycle by encouraging infrequent voters to vote, and by providing them with important information showing them how voting is relevant to their lives," said Cynthia Choi, Interim Executive Director of Khmer Girls in Action.
"This is a very critical time to educate our community. Without the vote, we don't have a voice. Without a voice, we don't have power. We are very excited about this project," said Dae Yoon, Executive Director of the Korean Resource Center.
APALC's Eugene Lee shows a copy of the mailers that they will be sending to infrequent voters and new voters to encourage them to get out the vote. AJ Photo by Momar G VisayaSIPA's Gerlie Collado explained that they are working with FASGI to mobilize the community by providing volunteers for phone banking and information materials on voting will also be available in both offices.
The nine member community organizations will also conduct focus group discussions consisting of infrequent Asian American voters to analyze the voting behavior and fine-tune GOTV messages.
Dilkes said that the effects of getting the word out to the infrequent voters will have more long-term effects to the different communities. "We really need to educate our kababayans although we know for a fact that they have different priorities. Para ito sa kabutihan ng mga anak nila," Dilkes added.
"We are very hopeful that this project can continue in the years to come as we try to broaden the spectrum," Lee said. (AJ)