ELLY GRIMM
• Leader & Times
The 2024 elections will be coming up rapidly, and the Liberal Area Coalition for Families (LACF) is working hard to spread the word about everything that will be going on.
“To start, we’ve established voter pages on Facebook not just for Seward County but also for Haskell County and Stevens County. We’ve been sharing a lot of information on those pages, and we’ll continue to do that by reminding people to get registered but we’ll really start pushing more information after voter registration ends,” LACF Board President Kay Burtzloff said. “We’ve had a booth at the Farmer’s Market every week where we’ve been able to register voters, which has gone really well. We also push the ksvotes.org Web site because if someone is registered by paper by this year’s deadline, it has to be in by 5 p.m., but if registration is done online, it’s taken until midnight, which is handy. We also work really well with Stacia Long and the Seward County Clerk’s office, and I know she also very highly endorses the ksvotes.org Web site because everything comes in to them all ready to go without having to translate handwriting and all of that. I’ve also been reaching out to the local nursing homes, and I recently visited those facilities with vote by mail ballot applications, because we’ve actually had some feedback about those residents being a bit concerned. And we talk with those residents not just about the vote by mail, but we also remind them to be sure and have their voter registration updated and have some forms for that, and we do that so those residents know there is someone in town willing to help them with that.”
Something else Burtzloff said people should be aware of for this year is the availability of curbside voting.
“We’ve been doing that the past few years, and I remember one year Brookdale-Liberal Springs loaded up a resident in her 90s who wanted to be sure and vote, and we were able to do that for her,” Burtzloff said. “And when we do that curbside voting, there have to be two witnesses to make sure everything’s secure and all of that, and there are a few people who have volunteered to help with that for this year, which is great. And for the past few years, we’ve also worked to have children involved in the voting process by having a separate little ‘election’ of our own – we’ve had them vote on their favorite fruit/vegetable, pet, animal, and some of that, and we’re making plans for what we want to do for this year. And we want to get these children into that habit of voting, because they’ll learn just how important voting is as they get older and learn more about the government and all of that.”
Burtzloff also talked about the LACF’s workload for the election season so far.
“We actually work a lot harder with the local elections and during the non-presidential election years, because those elections have much lower voter turnout. We typically get around 50 percent turnout or around there for the presidential elections, but it’s much tougher getting voter turnout for the local elections,” Burtzloff said. “In the past, we’ve seen a surge of new voters for certain elections, so this time around, we want to work more on reminding people of the availability of early voting, because we’ve been able to make some good progress there. I know Stacia Long also really endorses the early voting and she spreads the word from her office about that, and we host a little party the Saturday before Election Day because the first year we did that, she had around 100 people come into her office and vote – again, on a Saturday. We really just want to spread the word and make sure people know what’s going on so they can make a plan to vote. The primary should be interesting, we’ve got multiple people running for the Seward County Commission and multiple candidates for the Register of Deeds office.”
“And with the candidates we’ve talked to, we’ve told them there’s nothing stopping them from hosting their own meet-and-greet events, those seem to be really popular,” LACF member Debra Huddleston said. “And I know there are citizens who would rather attend a meet-and-greet and have a bit of one-on-one time with a candidate rather than attending a forum and just hearing from everyone without being able to ask your own questions.”
Huddleston and Burtzloff added Liberal has a bit of an odd phenomenon when it comes to new voters.
“It’s definitely a bit odd, because we’ve increased the amount of registered voters, but not necessarily the overall voter turnout,” Huddleston said.
“And there could be multiple reasons behind that, such as people moving or passing away or whatever, but we honestly don’t know the minutiae details of all of that. We do have access to data through the voter network we’re part of, and we can go in and see who’s voting – not necessarily HOW you’re voting, but whether or not you ARE voting consistently,” Burtzloff added. “We’ve done a little diving into that data, but something that’s really frustrating is finding out why people don’t register to vote and why they don’t vote. One of the issues has always been uncontested races, so by having races that are actually contested, we’re hoping more people will realize their vote Does count. Something else we’ve happily noticed is how more people are actually running for office, and how our governing entities are more closely reflecting the demographics of the community – in the past, the candidates/commissioners have been predominantly white males. And they did a good job in their roles, but it’s really important for a community’s governing boards to better reflect the community, and that’s been happening more in the past few elections.”
Huddleston and Burtzloff also agreed the main goal of their work is education.
“The main goal is education, and we also want to emphasize how important it is to vote – our goal is not to tell you who to vote for, but to encourage people to get out and make your voice heard, whichever party you happen to be affiliated with,” Huddleston said. “Local elections, more so than the federal elections, are especially important because the local governing entities are the ones influencing what goes on right in town and have more of a direct impact.”
“And there are people we hear all the time who complain about how things are being run in town, and then when we ask them ‘Did you go and vote?’ the answer is ‘No’ most of the time,” Burtzloff added. “We do this work because we passionately believe voting matters, and we bring up multiple instances where one vote truly did make a difference, so it always slightly grates on me when someone says ‘Well, my vote won’t matter anyway,’ and I’ve got proof your vote DOES matter. Unfortunately, however, there are those people who you just can’t convince otherwise when it comes to all of that, which is also somewhat infuriating. We are strictly a bipartisan group, so like Debra said, we won’t sway you to vote one way or the other, but we will give out the general information as far as who’s running for what office and all of that, and we’re happy to share that information with anyone who asks. And Kathleen Alonso has been doing some great work putting together infographics talking about what a primary is and how the voting process works to help put that information together for people who prefer the more visual information, and she’s also put together a questionnaire for the candidates for us to share online so people will know where they stand on the issues.”
Burtzloff also added encouragement for people to make their way to the polls for the primary and general elections.
“Like it’s already been said, voting is very important, and we want everyone to have their voices heard through the polls,” Burtzloff said. “And while we’re happy to share any information we can, we also encourage people to do some research of their own and come to a decision from what they learn. Especially with the local elections, again, these are the people who will be in charge of decisions affecting your more immediate area, so if you want to see change happen, you’ve got to get to the polls and vote. And especially with the newly registered voters, we want to encourage them to get into the habit of voting. We’re also going to be working with the Hispanic American Leadership Organization (HALO) at Seward County Community College and offer them some funding so they can do voter registration there on campus instead of LACF having to hire a third part and do that. We can do that through our grant, and I’ve gotten clearance for us to do that, and it’s something we’re really excited about.”
Overall, Burtzloff said, everyone should get the chance to have their voice heard at the ballot box.
“I would just like to emphasize again how we just want to encourage people to get out and vote, no matter what your party affiliation happens to be, because when we all take part in the democratic process, it’s better for everyone,” Burtzloff said. “We’re going to continue spreading the word and letting people know what all will be going on, and if anyone has any questions or anything, they are more than welcome to get in touch with us.”
