To help your friends vote in the August 20 Election, you can start by understanding the election calendar. Election day is August 20, but a key date for us is July 18, the deadline for the supervisor of elections to began mailing ballots to voters who’ve signed up to vote by mail. All if us, and everyone we know, needs to be ready to vote once their mail ballots arrive.
Here’s an example of how important it is that we all sign up for a mail ballot. In the March 2024 municipal elections, the turnout was 61% for voters who signed up to vote by mail, but only 12% for those who were not signed up. The difference was particularly dramatic because it was a municipal election, but even in a general election the difference in turnout is above 20 percentage points. Click here for more information about why we all should sign up for a mail ballot. Click here for information about how to sign up.
Despite all our efforts some of our friends and family will vote in person. So the next big day is August 10, when early voting begins. Voters can vote early at any Supervisor of Elections office. Click here for dates, times, and locations for Early Voting.
We’ll help you give them info about early voting times and locations.
All of us, and every like-minded voter we know, needs to have already voted by these final days before Election Day. Because it’s in these days that disengaged voters begin to become engaged. We need to be there to help like-minded newly engaged voters vote. Among other things, we need to staff polling places to provide info about down ballot races.
So, the first step is to get our mail ballot voters the information they need to cast their ballots. You’ll know your voter is signed up to vote by mail because there will be a “VBM” tag on their home screen in the Voter Action Pinellas campaign, in the Reach app. If you haven't started using our Reach campaign yet, you can find training HERE, on our home page; just scroll down.
You can filter your voter list so that it contains just mail ballot voters. Click HERE to learn how to filter your voter list.
You can text or email a link to their Voter Guide. Just click on the icon that applies. Click HERE for more information about texting or emailing from the Reach app.
You will land on a screen that will give you messaging options. In this case, select “What’s on your August ballot.”
Once you’ve selected the script, select “use this script.”
You’ll be directed to a text or email that is ready to be customized for your voter. Personalize this as you would any text or email that you would send to your voter. Ideally, you will share your voting choices.
The link will direct your voter to the address lookup tool. Click HERE for more information about how the address lookup tool works.
Your voter will land on a voter guide with information about everything on their ballot for their precinct. This is a voter guide for people who live in Oldsmar, where there is a municipal election in August. Registered Democrats in Oldsmar may also vote in the Democratic Primary for U.S. Congressional District 13. All Oldsmar voters may vote in the race for the School Board District 4 seat.
You also can provide your voter with information about how to submit their mail ballot.
After making this selection, you'll land on a customizable script with a link to mail ballot submission information. Click HERE to see the information that you can share.
You may have voters in your network who are not signed up to vote by mail. It is not too late for those voters to request a mail ballot for the august election. The Supervisor must receive a voter’s mail ballot request by August 8th, for a ballot to be mailed to the voter. Click HERE for information about how you can help your voters sign up to vote by mail.
If you see a “Dropped” tag, that means that the voter voted with a mail ballot in 2022, but has not renewed their mail ballot request. All mail ballot voters were dropped from the mail ballot list after the November 2022 election, and we all are required to renew our request for the 2022-2024 elections. A voter with a “Dropped” tag is likely to want to vote by mail, but may not know they have been dropped from the list. Please make it a priority to contact this voter and help them sign up for a mail ballot. Click HERE for information about how you can help a voter sign up to vote by mail.
Your personal communications with your voters are the thing that will most impact whether or not they will vote. Be sure to make note of the information you learn. Go to the Survey page, and start by confirming your voter’s political leanings.
Then let us know if your voter is vote-ready. Just check the categories that apply.
Finally, let us know how your voter will vote, or if they have already voted.
We will be updating our voter data, so you’ll be able to see that your voters have been processed. And if you are helping them sign up for a mail ballot, you’ll be able to see that their mail ballot requests have been processed.
If you have any questions, please contact your Point Person. If you’re not sure who your Point Person is or you don’t yet have a Point Person assignment, please contact us at https://voteractionpinellas.org/contact/. Thank you!
