WV Can't Wait
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Template:TOCnestleft WV Can't Wait was founded in 2017 to build working-class political power in the state – independent of either political party.[1]
- WV Can't Wait is a two-year-old movement organization that aims to win a people’s government in the Mountain State. The 2020 primaries marked our first foray into electoral organizing. We recruited and supported 101 candidates for office, from the city council to the governorship. We ran candidates on any ballot line so long as they signed our Candidate Pledge: never accept corporate cash, never cross a picket line, never punch down, and never hide from a debate.
- WV Can't Wait recruited 397 Neighborhood Captains over about a month’s time; each took responsibility for corresponding with an assigned batch of one hundred voters in their county, a combination of Democrats and Independents, high and low frequency voters. Each volunteer sent introductory letters in hand-addressed envelopes, made follow-up calls a week later, texted reminders about absentee ballots, made another round of check-in calls, and sent handwritten postcards. Volunteers began their relationships with voters by offering to connect them to local aid and information, such as how to access food, medicine, or unemployment benefits, but they also attempted to build real relationships by asking voters open-ended questions about their lives. The program aimed not just to turn people out or help them through a pandemic but to craft new political relationships that could last beyond the election and the crisis.
- Among low turnout Democrats, the Neighborhood Captain program increased voter participation by 15.7 percent (from 11.8 percent to 27.5 percent).[2]
People
- Katey Lauer is the co-chair of WV Can't Wait, an organization founded in 2017 to build working-class political power in the state – independent of either political party.[3]
- Stephen Smith is a co-chair of WV Can't Wait and ran for governor in 2020. He has organized with the WV Healthy Kids and Families Coalition, the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, and the Harvard Living Wage Campaign. Mr. Smith is the author of Stoking.[4]
- Sarah Hutson is a Canvass Director at Zero Week Solutions. She is the former Field Director at Smith for WV, where she led the unionization of the campaign staff. She remains a proud member of the Campaign Workers Guild. Ms. Hutson resides in Morgantown, West Virginia.[5]
- Janina Sites Cabella County captain
- Rachel Byrne Mongalia County captain
- Deb McCarthy Mercer County captain
- Nancy Peyton volunteer
- Rebecca Speakman Educators Can't Wait captainNick Hess volunteer
- Adam Starks volunteer
- Danielle Stewart candidate