A couple of weeks ago, the local Obama For American person for the 45th ld called me up and talked me into making some phone calls. Ugh, I thought, cold calling people and trying to talk them into voting for my candidate. Next thing I knew I was the precinct captain, and then the area captain for Juanita High School which had 23 precincts and 113 delegates up for grabs.
Then, it turned out that Rita, the coordinator for the 45th, was heading out of town to work the Colorado caucus, and they needed me to fill in for that role. Now I was looking at trying to keep track of 160 precincts and 722 possible delegates. What had I gotten myself into?
Once the campaign staff got settled in, they started to provide us with access to database and phonebanking tools. Rita had already set up quite a few volunteers, but there was still so much to do. I planned for two days of "vacation" Thurs and Fri so I could try ot keep up with things.
Meanwhile, I kept finding out about things I needed to do to coordinate with the Democratic Party. Attend the general membership meeting for the 45th, ok. Oh, they want each campaign to give a report? Not prepared in the least, I probably sounded disorganized and naive (mainly because I was). But people were very receptive and energetic. Later I saw that a poll of their membership through their Yahoo! group was 80% Obama. I guess it was an easy crowd to speak to.
Early in the week before the caucus, the focus was on phonebanking - get out the word about the caucus, find more volunteers, etc. As it turned out, I think the news coverage and candidate visits were huge in getting people interested in the caucus, and I think people were very resourceful in finding what they needed to do. 10 days before the caucus there was little awareness of it when we were calling; a couple of days before, everyone knew and was planning to go. As much as I'd like to take the credit for that, we just didn't have enough people working the phones in the 45th to make that size of difference. Credit goes to all the individual Obama supporters out there.
Phonebanking did well for identifying volunteer prospects, but far more useful was the data that was coming out of the website signups. By mid=week we were shifting to getting more precinct captains, identifying area captains, getting information out to people, and connecting people with each other. This part was incredibly gratifying, because so many people were delighted to get a chance to volunteer - all they needed were tools and a direction. Some of our key volunteers from the start of the phonebanking push were instrumental here, in making calls into areas where we had no one, and driving buttons and signs around to them.
My "vacation" days Thursday and Friday were spent working 14 - 16 hour days. Pulling lists of potential volunteers from the database, organized by precinct. Assembling information and getting it out to people. Tinkering with my mail program because I was sending so many messages that I was over the daily limit allowed by my hosting company. Calling and leaving messages all afternoon to recruit volunteers, and coordinating other people (thanks Katy!) doing the same. By this time, Rita was back, and I was also serving a secretary and database resource for all of her efforts. Spending most of the night just responding to calls and emails. Getting email threads started among the volunteers at each location.
The difference that it made was not what I'd imagined in the beginning. I thought we were going to have to spend a lot of time on the phones, just convincing people to support Obama, convincing them that it was worth their time to go to the caucus.
In actual fact, what our effort contributed was not to drive turn-out. Barack Obama himself, and the contagious enthusiasm he produces in people, did that job for us. What we contributed was providing people with signs & buttons, and encouraging them to arrive early and make Barack Obama a presence all over the location. We answered their questions about the caucus, and got the excellent materials from the campaign HQ out to them so they could be prepared. We made sure they knew how things were supposed to work, so that they could send up a red flag if something was not going correctly (nothing like this happened in the 45th to my knowledge).
It didn't go perfectly. Some locations still only had one volunteer; some locations were only organized at the last possible minute; some locations didn't get nearly enough materials; and one location had the area captain show up too late with the materials to really make an impact.
It felt incredible to have helped Obama supporters in nearly every location to walk into their caucus with confidence, tools, and knowledge. And I'm sure it made a big difference for everyone out there, at least in terms of the caucus experience. Did it get a few more votes? I think it probably did, primarily because people knew about the speaking opportunities and were prepared; I'm sure many of the speeches given were effective in swaying uncommitteds, Edwards, and Kucinich supporters.
I didn't think my speech at Juanita was too hot, mainly because I wasn't prepared for all the cheering people would do, and it flustered me.
My precinct in 2004 had 18 attendees. This time it had 63. Our 8 delegates went 6 Obama, 2 Clinton. It was exciting to get two of the young people lined up as Obama delegates; my wife thinks that they could become the next Obama Girls.
Finally, to end the day, watching Obama's victory speech on a big tv down at the campaign party at FX Mcrory's downtown. People were pumped up and so happy, and Barack was at his most fiery at the podium.
Simply amazing, Washington. I'm proud of the efforts I was able to contribute, but the real credit goes to all the people who were so inspired, whether they were chipping in as volunteers or simply showing up to cast their vote.
We're going to take this nomination, and then we're going to take back the White House! It's time to change America!
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