The West Potomac H.S. YD's Power MVDDC's 45th Efforts
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Nov 10, 2007 Posted by chair01 MVDemocrats
Del. David Englin faced his first challenge this year from a well-funded challenger - real estate attorney Mark Allen. In April, Mark Allen came to the Alexandria Democratic Committee meeting and indicated that he was considering a primary, but instead opted to file as a Republican. Englin carried every one of his Mt. Vernon Precincts.
Englin Mt. Vernon Results
Precinct Englin Allen Belleview 67.8% 32.11% Kirkside 71.99% 28.00% Marlan 53.60% 46.39% Grosvenor 71.67% 28.32% The West Potomac Young Democrats
The real story in the Englin race in Mt. Vernon was the West Potomac Young Democrats Club. A few weeks before the election, the West Potomac H.S. YD's Co-Presidents, Taylor Dankmyer and Emily Kuhbach approached the MVDDC and the Englin Campaign about taking a strong role in this year's elections. The MVDDC worked with the Englin Campaign to come up with a Get Out the Vote Plan for Mt. Vernon's Grosvenor Precinct. Grosvenor Precinct is a small precinct, primarily apartments and suffers from very low voter turnout. Starting the weekend before the election, the West Potomac YD's started knocking doors and working inside apartment buildings trying to inform voters of the coming election.
The night before the election, they leafleted key parking lots. On Election Day, they put up signs directing people to the new and difficult to find polling place. They handed out sample ballots, checked names of voters off inside the polling place, knocked doors during the day, and stationed themselves at key bus stops at the Huntington Metro reminding voters to cast their votes.
What were the results? Well voter turnout was down in everyone of Mt. Vernon's precincts in the 45th district except one - Grosvenor.
45th District Turnout
Precinct 2003 2007 Difference Belleview 31.5% 29.1% -2.4% Kirkside 47.0% 42.8% -4.2% Marlan 39.5% 36.8% -2.9% Grosvenor 15.4% 19.5% +4.1% In fact, given that Grosvenor is usually one of Mt. Vernon's poorest turnout precincts, one would think that if turnout was down generally, it would especially be down there. The West Potomac YD's can see some real results in their efforts and they executed their plan with zero assistance from adults from the Saturday before the Election, through Election day. Does hard work make a difference? The results speak for themselves.