Encouraging young citizenship: the Virginia House of Delegates faced the challenge of getting young people involved in the political process in a first-ever bipartisan conference.

If recent trends hold, only about 15 percent of citizens aged 18 to 25 will vote in November. Politicians cite this to justify why they typically pay little attention to young people. In a sad corollary, most young people cite being ignored by politicians as a major reason for not voting.

Most young Americans will also tell you that they reach voting age less well prepared than they feel they need to be to participate intelligently in elections. And fewer of them have grown up with the positive role model of parents who vote or participate in other civic activities.

These stark facts go a long way toward explaining the low level of interest and participation by young adults in the political and civic life of the country, according to research conducted by the council for Excellence in Government (CEG) and the Center for Information and Research in Civic Learning and Engagement.

Doing something about this problem became the organizing principle for the first-ever bipartisan conference held by the Virginia House of Delegates last April in Staunton, Va. The issue for the weekend was how to get young people more engaged in the civic life of the commonwealth and the country, from voting to playing a greater role in public affairs generally.

Two newly elected delegates--Republican Chris Saxman and Chap Petersen, a Democrat--were instrumental in organizing the weekend. The topic came easily to them. They met while participating in CEG's Virginia Campaign for Young Voters and, in the process, became concerned about how few participate.

Shortly after their election, they also became intrigued with the idea of helping their colleagues get to know each other better across party lines and perhaps make legislative life a little less contentious. They approached their parties' leaders in January with a proposal for a bipartisan conference.

"Even though we were new guys, or maybe because we were," Saxman recalls, "the speaker and others were willing to let us try. Everyone knew there was some room for improvement in the way the parties dealt with each other at the Capitol." He and Petersen recruited several colleagues, including more senior delegates, to serve on a planning committee.

"We started thinking about a topic for a weekend program. Going back to what brought Chris and me together--getting young people more involved--seemed like a natural," Petersen says. "It's an issue that didn't 'belong' to either side, and we all had a pretty good sense of its importance in the long haul."

The legislators asked the Center for Excellence in Government's Center for Democracy & Citizenship to help manage the conference, looking to the center's experience managing the biennial bipartisan retreats for the U.S. House of Representatives. They also leaned heavily on veteran House of Delegates Clerk Bruce Jamerson for in-house support.

Jamerson says he welcomed the opportunity to help test a different approach for the institution he's served for 28 years. "I saw this as a novel idea with enormous potential for promoting the long-term vitality of the institution. My staff and I were glad to do all we could to make it succeed."

The planning committee picked a weekend in April after the regular House session adjourned as the first practical date. Saxman's home area of Staunton in the Shenandoah Valley got the nod as site for the event. Not only was the Staunton Spring Victorian Festival the same weekend, but the conference work sessions could be held in Trinity Episcopal Church, where the General Assembly met in 1781 after British troops forced them to flee Richmond and then Charlottesville.

Raising the funds to cover conference costs turned out to be difficult, given the short time available, But foundation, corporate, association and individual donors eventually contributed some $35,000.

MEETING, GREETING AND GETTING OUT THE VOTE

The program for the weekend evolved with a roughly even split between working sessions on youth civic engagement and social activities designed to give delegates and their families time simply to become better acquainted. A key to success was including spouses and children in the weekend. "Having families around created an entirely different atmosphere than we experience in Richmond, and a more agreeable one," says Delegate Steve Landes, a member of the planning committee.

The substantive program began with a presentation by national pollsters Celinda Lake and Ed Goeas, who often team up for bipartisan work. They briefed the delegates about their January poll that probed the views of 1,500 young people (ages 15 to 25) about politics, voting, civic involvement and public affairs. (Results can be found at www.youngcitizensurvey.org)

Among their points:

* The aftermath of Sept. 11 provides an opportunity to capitalize on more positive feelings about government and politics.

* This age group is up for grabs, without strong loyalties to either party; they are waiting for candidates to ask for their votes.

* They are serious-minded in deciding how to vote, paying most attention to candidates' stands on the issues, record of service and experience.

* Most think candidates do not take them seriously.

Saturday's work sessions included presentations by a panel of researchers, educators and activists, and a group of young people. The first panel sketched out what is understood about youth involvement and made suggestions about what might be done to improve things. The discussion focused on civic education and citizenship-building programs in the community.

The young people's panel provided a fairly blunt reality check for the lawmakers. The panel explained how ill-prepared many of them feel and also just how out of touch with young people's concerns most politicians seem.

With that in mind at the concluding session Sunday morning, delegates talked over a range of things they could do to reach out to young citizens more effectively. Several proposals received favorable consideration, including:

* A joint resolution and follow-up effort statewide to encourage all parents to "Take Your Kids to Vote."

* Updating and expanding distribution of the video explaining the workings of the General Assembly.

* Increasing delegates' visits to schools and developing teaching materials for them that integrate with requirements for state standards of learning.

* Reviewing those standards with colleagues, educators and executive branch officials to improve youth civic engagement.

The House has been out of session since the conference. "It is too early to answer any questions about advancing the proposals that came out of the retreat until January," says Majority Whip Jeannemarie Devolites. "The joint resolution encouraging parents to take their kids to vote is likely to be taken up at that time, and certainly we can encourage members of the legislature to continue visiting schools to talk to the children about our jobs and how important it is for them to vote."

Because of a late start, the novelty of the conference idea and some partisan flare-ups in Richmond right before the event, attendance was lower than organizers hoped. About a quarter of the House attended, weighted a bit toward more junior members. The party breakdown mirrored that of the full House, 2:1 Republican.

The organizers found god news in the positive results and the broad support that followed for holding another conference. "I think we established a great tradition for the House." Saxman says. "Since April, lots of colleagues who couldn't attend have told me they hope we'll do it again." For Petersen, it is "encouraging the way everyone took the issue to heart and dealt with each other in a way that shows the potential when there's some bipartisan collaboration."

RELATED ARTICLE: A QUEST FOR 30 MILLION MISSING VOTERS

The Campaign for Young Voters (CYV) has a simple mission: to help candidates pay more attention to younger voters (18 to 25) and so boost their voting participation. It takes its slogan from the 30 million eligible young adults who won't vote this year--unless candidates start to ask them.

CYV's appeal is pragmatic--a "toolkit" with information and how-to advice designed to make it easier for campaigns to understand younger voters and fashion a strategy to reach them and turn them out on Election Day. It is based on extensive research, including a January survey of 1,500 young people conducted by national pollsters Celinda Lake and Ed Goeas.

Unlike the many worthy organizations working directly to persuade young adults that they have a stake in elections and should vote, CYV takes a different tack. It appeals to candidate self-interest in winning elections.

CYV knew there was a lot of market resistance to overcome, with the typical campaign "realist" arguing against spending scarce resources on a younger constituency because so few vote, (Of course, one big reason for that is most candidates' habit of ignoring them.) So, what to do?

The answer was the booklet used to mail the CD-ROM toolkit to about 10,000 federal and state candidates in June. In a catchy point, counterpoint format, myths about younger voters are refuted with realities:

Myth: The other party has     Reality: The age group is
most of the younger voters.   evenly split among Republi-
                              cans, Democrats and
                              Independents.

Myth: You need a separate     Reality: At any given time,
platform for young voters.    young voters' top issues are
                              much the same as older
                              people's.

Myth: Time spent on young     Reality: Older voters like
voters is lost from older     candidates who pay attention
voters.                       to young people; and
                              there's even a "trickle up"
                              effect from young to old.

The candidate toolkit is available online at
www.campaignyoungvoters.org. CYV is a nonpartisan project of the Center
for Democracy & Citizenship at the Council for Excellence in Government,
funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts.

Condact: [e-mail].

David Skaggs is executive director of the Center for Democracy and Citizenship at the Council for Excellence in Government in Washington, D.C.