A program leader says the goal is to get three in 20 who attend to workshop to go out and vote.
FARMINGTON – During the 2000 presidential election, Maine had the second highest voter turnout rate of any state with 67.4 percent of eligible residents heading to the polls.
Still, nearly a third of Mainers chose not to exercise the right that comes with living in a democracy.
A workshop being held in Farmington this Thursday will strive to educate those who are eligible to vote about their rights and the importance of becoming informed and then casting a ballot.
Among the topics to be addressed in the Voting Rights Training include: ways to learn about candidates and issues, how to register, how voting fits into everyday life and how voting and the election process can help build community.
The goal, says Dixie Leavitt, one of the three leaders of this Thursday’s class, is to have three out of every 20 people who participate in the workshop come back after November and say, “I voted for the first time this year.”
Leavitt, is an adviser in the Gardiner/Augusta area for the group putting on the voter training called Speaking Up For Us, a statewide coalition that supports people who have developmental disabilities to speak up for their rights. The group has offices in Portland, Gardiner and Caribou.
Locally, the training is sponsored by LEAP, a private non-profit agency that provides community and residential supports in the area for people with developmental disabilities and mental retardation.
Although the class is being put on and sponsored by groups with ties to those with developmental disabilities, it is open to any eligible American over the age of 18.
In addition to Leavitt, James Oldenburg of Houlton, and state Rep. Arthur Lerman, D-Augusta, will teach the class.
“If you have this wonderful right that we do have,” explains Leavitt on the importance of being informed about the voting process, “you need to know how to use it.”
Rick Dorian, executive director of LEAP, is excited about bringing the training to the community not just for the consumers who have assisted living through LEAP, but for the greater public.
“We want to support everyone to be able to vote if they want to vote,” he said. “People need to be aware of the rights they have.”
People should not just be observers of their government, he added, but participants.
According to the Center for Voting and Democracy, a non-profit think tank out of Maryland, the United States has on average, the lowest voter turnout among mature democracies.
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