New ideas for campaigns

Written by: Keshini Ladduwahetty on Jan 6, 2010 10:17 AM EST

DC4D has a long and distinguished record of campaigning for progressive candidates running for national and local office.  Our members have logged hundreds of hours door-to-door canvassing, phone banking, and other get-out-the-vote efforts.  But we continue to ask the question: how can we be more effective?  How do we work smarter?

A small group of us met last December to brainstorm answers to these questions.  We got some expert advise from political professionals: Matt Kent, Field organizer for Judy Feder's 2008 congressional race and Field Director for Chuck Caputo's 2009 House of Delegates race, and Elise Richman, Field Director for Stevens Miller's 2009 House of Delegate race.

From our informal discussion, we came up with the following draft proposal for some new ideas in 2010.   This is a proposal that we plan to make in face-to-face meetings with candidates running this year for local and national office.

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DC4D Proposal for 2010 Campaigns

DC for Democracy is an all-volunteer, progressive, independent, non-partisan PAC and the DC affiliate of Democracy for America. We have a record of partnering with candidates our membership has endorsed to strengthen their field operations. In the 2009 general election, we partnered with 4 Virginia House of Delegate campaigns to knock on almost 2,000 doors in Fairfax and Loudoun counties. In 2008, we partnered with Judy Feder's general election congressional campaign, taking responsibility for 10 precincts in Virginia's 10th district, knocking on over 10,000 doors for Feder, Warner, and Obama. During the 2008 Presidential primary, we partnered with the Obama campaign in both Nevada and Pennsylvania, canvassing and phone banking to thousands of voters. We have worked for the campaigns of state and federal candidates every year since 2003, and have participated in numerous issue-oriented campaigns as well.

Our volunteers are diverse, seasoned, committed, politically savvy and mature, and we have multi-lingual capabilities. We are not only highly capable canvassers, but are fully capable of organizing volunteers in the neighborhoods being canvassed and effectively communicating a candidate’s message to diverse audiences. Reflecting on our experience, we believe that turning out voters in 2010 will require buttressing traditional field operations with such community organizing techniques.

Our Proposal for 2010 campaigns

• If we endorse your candidate, we may want to partner with you to augment your field operation. We would operate as a distinct team within your campaign organization, working closely with your staff.

• We would like ownership of the field operation for a manageable area (e.g. 1 precinct or part of precinct), with our work closely overseen by your campaign staff and subject to their approval.

• A first step (3-4 months before the election) would be to identify and meet with any existing party leaders or early candidate supporters in the selected area(s), to elicit their cooperation, including identifying appropriate neighborhood volunteers. Depending on the outcome, a second step would be to perform an initial canvas to identify progressive voters (by asking about issue positions) and to educate voters (e.g., turnout in their precinct vs. turnout generally). The canvass would identify additional committed neighborhood volunteers, who, along with any from step one, would form the grassroots presence of the campaign in that precinct.

• For 1 - 3 months before the election, we would work with the neighborhood leaders to train them on voter outreach. This would include house parties for the neighborhood leaders to build their networks, voter lists and campaign materials, visits to the campaign office, and identification of precinct or area captains. We would also monitor their progress on voter outreach, and supplement their efforts with our own.

• Beginning 1 month before the election, we would team up with the neighborhood leaders to perform concerted voter outreach through Election Day.

• Following the election, we propose to do an evaluation in collaboration with your campaign staff to attempt to measure the effects of this voter outreach method.

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What do you think?  We want to know!

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