ASPSU is working to register 2,510 Portland State students to vote by Jan. 5, 2010, and is looking for more volunteers to help register potential voters. The vote drive is important because students need to vote in Oregon’s upcoming special election on Jan. 25, said ASPSU President Jonathan Sanford.
“There are $733 million at stake in the special election that could dramatically affect students,” he said.
There are several ballot measures that, if passed during the special election, would repeal laws that established new taxes for businesses and individuals. Without that tax revenue, hundreds of millions of dollars will likely be taken from the state’s General Fund, which funds higher education, Sanford said.
“The general fund is discretionary, meaning that it’s not mandatory to fund higher education,” Sanford said. “The current state budget was built based on revenue from these taxes and if they are repealed, the budget will be significantly altered.”
It is important for students to register to vote because when students vote they gain legitimacy with lawmakers, according to Dorothy Zapf, a volunteer with the ASPSU Voter Registration Drive who just transferred to Portland State from Portland Community College.
“The more students vote, the more power we have with lawmakers, and that can equal lower tuition,” she said.
More volunteers are needed to help register voters, said Selina Paulsen, a sophomore who heads up the “class rap” portion of the voter drive.
Some professors allow ASPSU volunteers to come into their classrooms to give a short presentation about the need for students to register to vote and then hand out registration cards. Last week ASPSU exceeded their goal of gathering 300 new voter registration cards during class raps by 30.
Voter registration volunteers also canvass the South Park Blocks with registration cards and have so far been successful in collecting a total of 1,126 as of Tuesday.
The registration drive is held in conjunction with the Oregon Student Association, a lobbying organization founded by students over 30 years ago to represent the interests of students in postsecondary education to Oregon lawmakers.