Voter Data Management

1. Voter Data Management NY State Electoral Gathering June 13, 2008 www.progressivetech.org

2. Voter Engagement Cycle

3. Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan

4. Political Context Analysis Analyze why issue matters to you Analyze your own capacity what does the community stand to gain? What might it lose? how does your organization fit in?

5. Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan After the election Targeting The work

6. Targeting For the election - trying to win? Geographic Demographic For organizational growth For availability and usability of data

7. The Path to Voter Lists Strategic Targeting Understanding your region and base Voter analysis (eligibility, registration, participation levels)‏ Defined Targeted Areas Organization Assessment Precinct Analysis Precinct data on targeted areas, voter propensity, demographics Target Voter Universe (# voters and # precincts)‏ Refined strategy based on capacity & resources Capacity Resources Preliminary goals for: number of precincts, volunteers, voter contacts

8. What is meant by Strategic Targeting • Understanding your Region and Target Area • Analysis of your Base Constituency in terms of your local or regional Power Equation • What is it now (levels of registration & turn out)‏ • What’s the potential (increasing registration & turn out)‏ • Determining Where you can/want/need to build power • Geographic • Demographics • Voter Propensity

9. Strategic Targeting: Understanding Your Region and Base SCOPE Organizing Strategy focused in areas with high concentrations of members and high poverty rates. Other factors to consider Community Profile Ethnicity Income/ Poverty Levels Occupations Education Levels Welfare Recipients Types of Industry Incarceration Rates Linguistic Isolation Scale of Wages Age Housing Conditions Rent Pollution sites (power plants)‏

10. Precinct Analysis: Step 1 - Request Planning Counts Where do you get planning counts? • Voter data consultants • Data vendors (eg www.politicaldata.com)‏ • Voter tech tools (eg VAN / Voter Connect, CEL, Catalist)‏ What you can ask for (3 basic elements)‏ • Precincts in a targeted geography (political boundaries, cities, zip codes)‏ • Voter propensity (Likely, Occasional, New voters)‏ • Demographics A. Race: African American, Latino, Asian/Pacific Islander B. Age distribution: youth, middle aged, seniors C.Gender Requests can be broad or specific

11. Precinct Analysis: Step 2 – Analyze the Counts PLANNING COUNTS HELP YOU Identify a set Number of Precincts that you want to cover (mainly based on density)‏ 2. Prioritize precincts 3. Define your Voter Universe – number of voters combined Inform and refine your overall strategy based on capacity and resources

12. Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan Targeting The work

13. The work People you can recruit and train to work are the real product What data are you using? How are you tracking it? Where are the bottlenecks? Getting it into data file Getting the data into your file

14. Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan After the election Targeting The work

15. After the election Evaluation by staff AND volunteers Renew contact with voters met oriented to your issues Evaluate your issues in light of what you learned GROW (we hope)

16. Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan After the election Targeting Do it all again, Better. The work

19. DATA MANAGEMENT • What do you need to know in order to do this activity? • What information will you collect in the course of doing this activity? • Why is this information important?

21. Field Tools: Walk / Call Lists, PDAs, predictive dialer / robo-calls, door hangers, etc. • Data Entry: bar code scanners, volunteers / staff do manual data entry, staff to manage/monitor quality of data • Skills Needed: create walk/call lists, set up voter engagement database, data entry training, field planning, analysis of data, etc., • Other support: integration of voter data into organizational database, tech support, etc.

23. Voter Data Cycle

25. Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan After the election Targeting The work

26. targeting • Assess demographics • Assess voter behavior • Assess political terrain • Assess organizational capacity

27. Prepare voter contact database • Develop voter contact data workflow • Pull / Set up voter lists • Merge voter lists with membership lists

28. Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan After the election Targeting The Work

30. Produce outputs for voter contact • Develop phone/walksheets based on campaign needs • Develop reports to assess progress/performance during campaign

31. Enter voter contacts into field database • Using data entry tech and volunteers, get canvass data back into database • Generate new phone/walksheets based on results of prior contacts

32. Post-election

33. Voter Engagement Cycle Analyze -- plan After the election Targeting The Work

35. ID Voter Contacts for follow-up

36. Store results of voter contact

37. Merge voter contacts into member list

38. Enhanced list Member Data Voter Data Enhanced List

39. It’s all about the Voter ID Number Voter File Membership Database

40. Let’s take a gander at the VAN

49. http://votertechkit.progressivetech.org Announcing the First Online Learning Site for Community Organizers Working on Voter Projects.  Learn from the experiences of other organizers

50. PTP Power On Network Technology Information and Resource Sharing for Community Organizers http://network.progressivetech.org