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Palm Beach, Florida - elections office reaches out to minority voters

By Josh Hafenbrack

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

September 17, 2006

Undistracted by lingering calls for a paper trail of election ballots and harping about a slow vote count on primary night, Elections Supervisor Arthur Anderson is quietly revolutionizing his office.

Using the Supervisor of Elections office as what he calls a "change agent," Anderson is pursuing a costly campaign to raise the sense of civic duty in minority and poor communities, reversing what he calls a "myopic focus on the affluent, those who do go to the polls consistently."

To this end, Anderson budgeted an unprecedented $550,000 for a voter-outreach media blitz of TV ads and radio spots -- starring himself -- that started before the primaries and will run up to the Nov. 7 general election.

What's more, Anderson is dispatching his employees into minority and poor communities, to knock on doors in low-turnout neighborhoods to sign up people to vote.

Rather than elections expertise, Anderson's new hires have second-language skills and ties to minority communities.

He hired outreach coordinators to the Hispanic, Haitian and black communities. More than one-fourth of Anderson's 43-person staff is on the voter-outreach team, said project coordinator Adina Serell.

Under Anderson's predecessor, Theresa LePore, one person handled voter outreach.

Anderson's quest is controversial.

Critics say such a social agenda is beyond the mission of the elections office and has partisan implications. Supporters see it as a noble bid to raise civic involvement.

In an interview in his office on Friday, Anderson said he wants to "make people believe that they can take control of their lives," and to educate communities that he says have been discriminated against and ignored by the government.

"Not everyone applauds these efforts," he said. "I'm not here to follow the status quo. My mission is to change the world in whatever way that I can, however small ... You have to have a vision other than being a technocrat."

But is it working?

In the Sept. 5 primary, Palm Beach County's 15 percent turnout was Florida's third worst; 94 percent of county precincts had fewer voters than in the last non-presidential primary in 2002, county elections data showed.

Rainy weather may have contributed to the dismal showing, but in the poor neighborhoods Anderson is courting, turnout lagged behind the county average, according to a South Florida Sun-Sentinel analysis of voter turnout data and the U.S. Census.

Anderson says the results would have been even worse if it wasn't for his voter-outreach program, and that changes won't come overnight. He frames his mission in lofty rhetoric, saying he's changing deep-seated beliefs in poor and minority communities that they don't have a place in the political process. His election-year theme reflects that -- "One Voice Becomes Many."

The logo is printed in Spanish and Creole.

Some wonder whether Anderson, a Democrat, should use his nonpartisan office to pursue such a social-change agenda.

"There's a line at which Arthur's job ends and ours [political parties] begins, and one might argue he's crossing the line," said Republican Party Chairman Sid Dinerstein. "And my party might argue he's crossing the line in areas that traditionally vote for the other party."

Political activist Andre Fladell, who helped get Anderson elected in 2004, said: "It's Arthur's responsibility to get people to have confidence in the process. Turning them out is not his responsibility."

Statewide, elections experts cite a shift toward broader voter-outreach efforts, but not always in Anderson's socially minded mold.

Veteran Pasco County Supervisor Kurt Browning sends his staff to local fairs and festivals, but draws the line there.

"My job is elections administration," he said. "I think we have an educational component to that, but the educational component kind of stops at voter registration and voting equipment."

Despite his focus on social change, Anderson still confronts questions over the paper trail, the key issue when he ousted the controversial LePore, who introduced use of the butterfly ballot in county elections. Anderson says he's done all he can to achieve a verifiable record to go along with touch-screen machines. But Democrats aren't satisfied.

"I think Arthur's doing a good job, in terms of changing the tone and reaching out to folks," said Democratic Party Chairman Wahid Mahmood. But he added: "The paper trail is going to be in all the voters' minds. It's an issue that's not going to go away."

Staff researcher Jeremy Milarsky contributed to this story.

Josh Hafenbrack can be reached at

jhafenbrack@sun-sentinel.com or 561-228-5508.