Registration Drive Targets Minorities : Voting: Two groups are out to sign up Latinos and Asian-Americans for the Nov. 3 election.

Supermarkets, restaurants, churches and even nightclubs have become sites for two groups seeking to register Latino and Asian-American voters in the San Gabriel Valley.

More than 150 volunteers will work in separate voter registration drives by the Chinese American Coalition and by the San Gabriel Valley Southwest Voter Registration Education Project. The drives are aimed at registering people by the Oct. 5, deadline for voting in the Nov. 3 presidential election.

“Candidates have tried to get voters registered, but this area has never really been worked as far as a nonpartisan voter registration effort,” said Nancy Romero, project coordinator for the Latino registration drive.

That drive began in July with the opening of a Baldwin Park office. So far, 1,500 Latinos have been registered at more than 20 sites, including festivals and a Monterey Park nightclub, Romero said.

With Latinos being 70% of the population in El Monte, Baldwin Park and La Puente, the San Gabriel Valley was targeted as a prime area to register 4,000 Latino voters, Romero said. The effort includes Pico Rivera and Montebello.

“The issues out here in the small communities are not as intense as those in Los Angeles,” Romero said. “Latinos here are more comfortable and more community-oriented (than in Los Angeles).”

Meanwhile, the Asian-American voter registration drive focuses on Alhambra, San Gabriel and Rosemead, cities in which Asians are a third of the population, and in Monterey Park, which is 56% Asian.

Sponsored by a coalition of nine Chinese-American civic groups, the drive seeks to register 1,000 Asian-Americans by the registration deadline.

More than 100 volunteers will staff voter registration booths, make phone calls and door-to-door visits and place registration materials in stores and service organization offices, said Chris Cheung, chairman of the drive.

Because of repressive political climates in many Asian countries, many Asian-Americans have not been politically motivated, Cheung said.