Groups team up to increase voter turnout

Voter turnout in Tennessee is among the worst rates in the country.

In the Presidential primary and school board primary elections held in March, there was a 14 percent voter turnout rate, and many non-Presidential elections are typically that low or lower in Madison County.

There’s a coalition that’s just been formed whose objective is to combat that by not only getting more people registered to vote, but to also encourage those already registered to cast their vote when elections come up.

Clarence Boone, who’s one of the leaders for the New Jackson-Madison County Voters’ Council, was the first person speaking at the podium on June 28 discussing the Get Out The Vote Coalition.

“For too long, certain forces have worked to discourage participation in elections with burdensome voter ID laws, limited voting locations and vague threatening mailers,” Boone said. “Now more than a dozen grassroots organizations have combined to create the Get Out The Vote Coalition, and through community education, we’ll make sure all people in this county understand why voting matters and why their participation is important.”

The groups who make up the coalition include the voters’ council, NAACP, Code Red Coalition, Jackson chapter of the National Action Network, Alpha Phi fraternity, 100 Black Men of West Tennessee, the local chapter of the Democratic Party, Delta Sigma Theta, Sigma Gamma Rho, Barber School-1, 731 Project, Alpha Kappa Alpha, Omega Psi Phi and MAD Women.

Debbie Schwacker is a leader for MAD Women.

“We’re excited to be a part of this coalition to address something that’s been occurring in our state for decades, and it’s dwindling the number of voters in our state and communities,” Schwacker said. “And because of that, a minority of voters are electing people to office who are helping few Tennesseans more times than not.

“Our vote is our authority, and it’s time more of us began exercising that authority to make sure our elected officials represent our ideals.”

Sabrina Parker announced the establishment of the Jackson chapter of the National Action Network, a group founded by the Rev. Al Sharpton designed to get people out to vote.

“We’re proud to support the work of partner organizations, and as we’re getting our efforts started, we’ll be announcing upcoming activities we’ll have to get people signed up and out to vote.”

Harrell Carter, the president of the Jackson-Madison County chapter of the NAACP, said this effort – and no effort of the NAACP – partisan.

“We don’t support parties. We support issues,” Carter said. “And we invite Republicans and other parties to join us because this isn’t about parties as much as it is about getting people out to vote.

“We don’t have enough people coming to the polls because they’ve given up on the election process. We’ve got to change that.”

The next round of elections start next week as early voting starts July 12 through July 27 for the general election for school board and other local elections along with the primary for state representative and U.S. representative and senators.

Brandon Shields, brandon@jacksonpost.news