Looking for some exciting reading material? Start your week off right by diving into one of our shiny annual reports. These reports go into deal about our strengths from the previous year and cover our youth and voter engagement outreach, plus an analysis of our election work. Check them out:
Post-Election Report
This election featured extremely high voter turnout and smooth election administration. In order to help ensure a successful election, the League of Women Voters conducted several forms of election observation and voter assistance prior to and on Election Day. Here's our impact and recommendations.
Voter Engagement Annual Report
We worked to reach voters broadly. We created both paper and digital voter guides, published information about how to vote in ten languages, canvassed in 15 different towns with a higher population of low-propensity voters, and expanded our youth outreach in high schools and colleges. Here’s our impact.
Maine Students Vote Annual Report
Young people nationwide turned out for the November midterm election in record numbers. Through joining forces with the League of Women Voters of Maine, Maine Students Vote has been able to more than double the number of campuses and high schools that we support.
Here's what we're watching this week:
As a reminder, most of our priority bills appear before the State and Local Government (SLG) or Veterans and Legal Affairs (VLA) Committee. These bills have a public hearing first and then are workshopped in a work session. The committee will make recommendations on the bill or kill it in the work session. If the bill survives the committee, it advances to the floor.
- LD 34 — Photo ID: The work session is scheduled for Friday, March 3 at 9:00 AM in VLA. We're crossing our fingers that this one dies in committee.
- 🌟 New! LD 577 — Town Websites to Host More Election Info: Not every town has a website, and some towns that do have websites fail to post timely or accurate info ahead of an election. This bill would beef up the website infrastructure for municipalities and counties and would be hosted through the Secretary of State's website. We support the bill — we helped write it! Its public hearing is scheduled for Thursday, March 2 in SLG. If you've experienced difficulty finding your local election info online, tell us your story. We would love a short piece of testimony that gives an example of the problem. Email Lane for more information at lane@lwvme.org.
What's on the horizon?
More bills are coming. Keep your eyes peeled for the National Popular Vote, expanding clean elections, tribal sovereignty, and more.
Ranked Choice Voting Toolkit Coming Soon
Local, direct democracy is a powerful right. Everyone should feel empowered to bring change to their community. And for those who want to give voters more choice — and more voice — we're publishing a Ranked Choice Voting Toolkit that covers the steps for implementing RCV in your town. We're here to help expand RCV across Maine for municipal elections. If you want to be a part of the RCV wave, mark your calendars for the toolkit's launch on March 1st.