THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 5, 1996 TAG: 9605060186
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LISE OLSEN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 113 lines
This election year, local democracy took root at places like LLL Foodmart: The owners turned a hot dog stand into a voter registration booth for a couple of busy weekends.
The cards went like hotcakes - er, hot dogs.
And registration in the downtown Norfolk voting precinct, named for the Hunton YMCA, grew more than any other in South Hampton Roads, according to information from the State Board of Elections.
Across the region, 14,557 new voters added their names to the rolls in 1996, many taking advantage of the opportunity to register by mail under the ``motor voter'' law, which took effect in March.
But now comes a more important test for all those neophytes to the political process: Will they make it to the polls on Tuesday?
There's a lot at stake in Hampton Roads:
Virginia Beach is trying to replenish a school board after a $12 million budget deficit and a grand jury probe that led to several resignations.
Portsmouth, Chesapeake and Virginia Beach voters are choosing their mayors. All five cities are putting members onto their councils.
In Portsmouth, voters are getting their first chance to pick a school board, and their neighbors in Virginia Beach, Chesapeake and Suffolk are doing it for just their second time.
In Virginia Beach, a referendum should decide whether the city splits into wards that can choose their own council and school board members.
Registering is easier now - people can pick up forms at the DMV, at the Social Services office, the public library or local businesses, fill them out and drop them into the mail.
(If you haven't already done it, it's too late for Tuesday's municipal elections. But if you're not registered, you can pick up forms now to be ready for the fall senate and presidential elections.)
To vote on Tuesday, citizens still must get to a precinct's voting place, fill out a ballot and stuff it in a box. The polls open at 6 a.m. and close at 7 p.m. Those who have registered by mail will need to bring a photo identification with them to cast a ballot.
Local elections may be less glamorous than the national campaigns, but they are no less important. Those elected on Tuesday will be in positions to raise taxes, build community centers and decide what children learn in school.
And in local elections, a single vote has more influence.
That's because fewer people typically vote in them - about 60 percent of registered voters compared with 80 percent in presidential elections. And those votes are often split among a lot more candidates - 43 in the Virginia Beach school board races, for example. That means one vote could decide a race.
Individuals just won't have that kind of clout in the Bob Dole/Bill Clinton match-up.
Registrars shake their heads when people bring up presidential races at this time of year.
Elisa Long, deputy registrar in the city of Norfolk, predicts that the motor voter changes and a big turnout in the fall will make for the largest election in national history next November. Just look, she says, at how many people have taken advantage of motor voter already, though it's been in effect only since March in Virginia. Perhaps 20 percent to 40 percent more people will participate, she predicts.
Still, Long's expectations for Tuesday aren't quite so high.
``Now that voter registration is so available, it's wonderful, but the important part of it is exercising that right,'' she said. ``People vote in a presidential election, but if they want to affect their lives on a daily basis, it is the city election that does that.''
Norfolk is the only South Hampton Roads city in which voter rolls did not grow in 1996.
The city did add 2,738 new voters to its list, many of whom took advantage of forms available at the Department of Motor Vehicles or Department of Social Services.
But they were offset by more than 2,000 people already on the city's rolls who were purged because they hadn't voted in four years. Combined with those who were removed due to deaths, it left Norfolk with a net loss of voters.
Still, Long and others expect 1996 to be a boom year for voter registration in Virginia, based on huge increases in registration in other states where the motor voter law has been in effect longer.
In the Tidewater Gardens neighborhood, part of the Hunton Y precinct, Evelyn Powell Porter and other residents are already seeing a change. Porter says more new residents and young people registered this year because it was so convenient to walk over to LLL Foodmart and grab a form.
``Lots of kids picked them up when they were buying snacks,'' she said.
Store owner Larry Donnell, a resident of Virginia Beach, says he started the drive before the motor voter law went into effect. He invited a registrar in to sign up people on weekends at first. But now his employees keep the information and registration forms behind the counter at all times. He focuses his effort on the young adults who haven't felt they were part of the electoral system.
``I just saw a need for that,'' Donnell said. ``A lot of people just don't take the initiative to find a place to vote.''
Perhaps one day, Long muses, it will be as easy to vote as it is now to register: just by dropping a ballot into the mail. ILLUSTRATION: Graphics
NEW REGISTRATION LEADERS
Precincts with the most new voters in 1996
(Ranked by percentage of total voters)
[For complete graphic, please see microfilm]
TO VOTE
Unsure where to vote? Call your city's registrar:
Chesapeake: 547-6141
Norfolk: 664-4353
Portsmouth: 393-8644
Suffolk: 925-6391
Virginia Beach: 427-8683
KEYWORDS: VOTER REGISTRATION TIDEWATER ELECTION TIDEWATER by CNB