Voter registration letters confusing residents

Letters from a group trying to get people to register to vote is causing some confusion across California and here on the Central Coast. The Voter Participation Center is a non-profit based in Washington, D.C. It’s sent out roughly 4.6 million letters in California to addresses it believes has unregistered, eligible voters.

The letters encourage people to register before the deadline. While many of these letters have gone to their intended targets, a small percentage has ended up going to kids, pets, and even the deceased. A non-eligible young lady in Santa Cruz county got one of those letters and here’s how she handled the situation.

“A 12-year old girl named Sara who lives here in Santa Cruz County wrote back Paige Gardner and said “‘As much as she would love to voice her opinion and make sure our country is under the right leader, I’m only 12-years old.”‘ So she sent back a really nice letter to this person telling her that she’s not eligible to vote,” said Santa Cruz City Clerk Gail Pellerin.

We contacted the Voter Participation Center and it said states do not make available lists of people who are unregistered to vote, so it has to use commercial databases and match them to the state’s voter files. The non-profit says it spends a lot of time and money fine-tuning it’s lists and tries to reduce the number of mailings that go to the wrong people.

The last day to register to vote is Monday, October 24th.