Overcoming voting barriers is key to Somos Cuyahoga 2024

The Young Latino Network is helping Latines from around Cleveland understand their rights as voters and connect them to election resources.

A Cleveland nonprofit that helps and supports the Latine community is energizing its base of voters, and potential voters, for the Nov. 5 election.

The Young Latino Network has sent door-to-door canvassers to homes in Cleveland Wards 14, 13, 12 and 5, all of which have significant Latine populations, to register residents there and urge them to vote. Meanwhile, phone canvassers have called Latine citizens throughout Cuyahoga County with the same message.

The campaign is called Somos (“We are”) Cuyahoga 2024. Since Sept. 8, canvassers have made nearly 12,000 visits and calls, spoke to more than 1,000 people and registered 153 new voters. They have distributed more than 1,600 pledge-to-vote cards, which residents fill out and return to the canvassers. The Young Latino Network then mails the cards back to residents to remind them to vote.

“We want to increase civic participation to combat the narrative of the invisible Latino constituency, which basically says that Latinos don’t vote,” said Camila Fox González, The Young Latino Network spokesperson. 

“But we do exist,” Fox González said. “We are registered voters. We are here. We’re civically engaged and we do have a voice.”

Fox González said the get-out-to-vote effort is especially important in Ward 14, where many local elections have been decided by fewer than 120 votes. Further, voter turnout and registration in Ward 14 have been the lowest in Cleveland. 

The Somos Cuyahoga 2024 campaign will continue until Election Day. The goal is to increase the number of Latines voting in Cuyahoga County by 3 percent, or about 400 people, compared to previous general elections. 

The campaign is nonpartisan when it comes to candidates but it is promoting Issue 1, which would change the way state legislative districts are drawn. 

Overcoming barriers

Fox González said Somos Cuyahoga 2024 is trying to overcome obstacles that Latine voters face. For example, a new Ohio voter identification law, which took effect in 2023, requires voters to prove their identities at the polls with a driver’s license, state identification card or passport.  

Previously, voters without those forms of ID could use a utility bill or some other official piece of mail to vote. The stricter ID requirement has increased the burden on voters who are nondrivers and who don’t have passports. They must take the extra step of obtaining a state ID. 

State ID cards can be ordered at any Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles office. It can take several weeks to receive the card in the mail but the BMV office will immediately provide an interim card applicants can use until then. 

Another problem is that, although ballots are in both English and Spanish, campaign and election materials that discuss candidates and issues are typically in English only.

Fox González said many Latinos speak only Spanish. That’s why it’s important for candidates and political parties to distribute campaign materials in both languages.

“We’re not being considered in the election process, [it’s] as if we don’t exist,” Fox González said. “We’re not being informed the way we need to be informed.”

Helping others vote

The Young Latino Network – which started as a professional networking group in 2002 but which has evolved into a nonprofit that serves and advocates for all Latines in Greater Cleveland – has never before organized a political campaign like Somos Cuyahoga 2024. 

The organization, with offices on Fulton Road in the Clark-Fulton neighborhood, hired temporary canvassers and office workers as contractors for the campaign. 

One of the hired hands is Alberto Ramos Cordero, a Puerto Rico native who now lives in Collinwood. He founded Cleveland Tango School, works as a community organizer and runs a community orchestra in his neighborhood. 

Cordero was lead door-to-door canvasser for Somos Cuyahoga 2024. It was the first time he worked on a political campaign since coming to the United States in 2015, although he was politically involved in Puerto Rico.

“I have noticed that the closer I am to the political process, the more optimistic I am about the outcomes,” Cordero said. “Once you participate, it goes from being very national to very local.”

Somos Cuyahoga 2024 was an eye-opener for Cordero. He knew the areas he canvassed were heavily populated with Latines but he didn’t realize that there were pockets where residents spoke nothing but Spanish. Also, many residents in those neighborhoods are first-generation immigrants.

“We found a lot of people old and infirmed, and they would not have been able to vote if we hadn’t been there,” Cordero said.

Cordero met an older man who came from a Puerto Rican neighborhood close to where Cordero grew up. The man was blind and didn’t think it was possible for him to vote. Cordero showed him how he could vote by mail.

“He was living by himself and didn’t have much of a support network,” Cordero said. “It was really cool to have that much of an impact.”

Cordero also visited a family with an adult son with disabilities. They had their hands full and just didn’t have time to get to the polls. Cordero worked it out so they could vote by mail.

“I would recommend to anyone to be part of the political process,” Cordero said. “The more of us are involved, the better outcome we will get. Go out and canvass and meet your neighbors. We sink or swim together.”