58°
To the editor:
With the upcoming school board election scheduled for May 19, it’s the perfect time to start a new and different initiative in Putnam County: “Bring Your Children to Vote." We have a serious problem in our community and our nation. For whatever reason, we have lost our civic involvement. Many of us do not vote. In 2014, a midterm election, 36 percent of the registered voters cast a ballot.
Voter turnout during presidential elections is, as a rule, significantly higher. In the 2012, presidential election, 58 percent of eligible voters submitted ballots. In the Putnam Valley school board election in 2014, 942 people voted, which is 15 1/2 percent of eligible voters. I recently read about a study, done by New York University's Wagner Graduate School of Public Affairs, which found that 13 percent of young men under the age of 24 vote, while 19 percent of young women in the same age group cast their ballot. Eighteen- to 24-year-olds have the lowest rate of voter registration and actual voting in New York state.
These numbers are very troubling for the future of our nation. I believe if children learn the importance of voting early on, they're more likely to vote when they're older. We all need to set a good example for our children. If we act now as a community, we can change this trend and make Putnam County our state and our country even better than they are now.
William Gouldman, Putnam County legislator
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