The Young, the Polls and Lost Enthusiasm : Elections: Voting was once embraced as a rite of passage into adulthood. But these days, many first-time voters aren’t eager to cast their ballots.

Derek Lobato is tired of people lecturing him about voting in his first presidential election.

The 20-year-old security guard admits he has a lot at stake: a wife, an infant daughter and hopes of buying a house larger than his two-bedroom apartment in Torrance.

So why isn’t he voting on Nov. 3?

“I’ve listened to the candidates, and I have no hope for the country and no hope that I’ll ever be able to own a house,” he says.

A few months after Brian Yu turned 18, he was eager to vote. But that changed about a year ago when his family’s pizza business in downtown Los Angeles became another casualty of the recession. Yu, now 19, holds little hope that any of the candidates can resuscitate the economy, and, with two brothers in college, he spends a lot of time worrying about money.

“I don’t look forward to voting because my vote probably won’t make a difference, but I’m going to do it,” says Yu, a sophomore majoring in economics at UCLA. “I guess I’m just going to vote for the heck of it.”

Voting was once viewed as a rite of passage into adulthood. Indeed, going to the polls used to excite people from the ages of 18 to 24, according to Curtis Gans, who directs the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate, a Washington group that studies declining voter participation. But the recession, recent political scandals and negative campaigns continue to diminish the enthusiasm of young voters.

“In times like this, people will do their duty and vote without much enthusiasm for the candidates, or they just won’t vote,” Gans says.

Four years ago, one-third of all 18- to 20-year-olds and 38% of all 21- to 24-year-olds voted in the presidential election. But in 1972, when the voting age was first lowered to 18, about half of everyone from 18 to 24 went to the polls. “Lowering the voting age hasn’t made much of a difference because the rates keep going down,” says Jerry T. Jennings of the U.S. Census Bureau.

“Young people vote less because the kinds of things they are interested in--friends, going to college, deciding whether or not to get married--are marginally affected by the outcome of the election. Older people vote more because they tend to have families and they worry more about taxes and things like that.”

Yu would be more enthusiastic about voting if he was about to graduate and had to support himself. “That would make voting more urgent,” he says. “But right now, I still live with my family and have two more years of college.”

So will the 1992 presidential election set new records for indifference?

Bill Clinton and Al Gore have been courting young voters in the hope of reversing that trend. And Gans predicts that the turnout among 18- to 24-year-olds--concerned about the recession, education and the environment--will be higher than in 1988. “Even if they’re not excited about it,” he says, “I think more of them, especially college students, will vote.”

Including Shelton Sykes.

Sykes knows his vote won’t change the outcome of the election. And he’s angry because he believes the candidates have dodged issues, such as unemployment and homelessness, and ignored young voters.

Nonetheless, Sykes can’t wait to vote for the first time. “Getting my driver’s license meant squat and turning 21 will be no big deal because I don’t like to drink alcohol,” the 19-year-old said. “But voting makes me an adult.”

He recalls the frustration he felt being too young to vote in past elections. “It was hard hearing about the candidates and being powerless to do anything,” says Sykes, who lives in South-Central Los Angeles and attends Los Angeles Southwest College. “Voting happens to be an important responsibility.

“People in my age group think, ‘Why should I vote?’ ” he says. “They get the idea that they won’t matter until they’re in their 30s and have money, a job and two or three kids. Basically they feel misunderstood.”

Sharon Garrett, 21, says she has a responsibility to vote although she feels reluctant to cast her ballot. “I don’t believe in government regulation, and I don’t agree with any of the three candidates, but voting is something I should do even if just for the hell of it.”

Garrett, a registered Libertarian, said she is debating whether to cast a protest vote for Libertarian presidential candidate Andre Marrou--or vote for Bush or Ross Perot

“I know either way it won’t make a difference, so it really won’t matter what I decide,” says Garrett, who owns two flower shops with her brother. “I don’t have a good view of the election, and I am not hopeful about the future. Everyone wants a hero to save this country, but that’s just not going to happen.”

After struggling to support herself for the last five years as a manicurist, Rebecca Armijo, 23, says she has no time or energy to worry about who will be President. “I don’t care about it much,” she says.

The Redondo Beach resident refused to vote in 1988, plans to ignore the Nov. 3 election and will not vote in the future unless “something major happens.”

“I’m basically concerned about myself and trying to make a living,” Armijo says. “Besides, nothing would change if I voted. The three candidates are out for people in their age group who have money. They don’t see the bad things that go on in the lives of poor people and young people.”

They fail to understand the expenses and hassles involved in obtaining health insurance, says Armijo, who cannot afford to be covered. She says she would vote if a candidate could somehow lower costs and guarantee health care for everyone.

“It scares me to think what would happen to me and where I’d go if I got hurt,” she says. “But it just shows how bad things are, and how they’re continuing to get worse. That’s reality.

“In my fantasy, debts will be paid off, gangs will be taken care of and everyone will be able to get health care. That could only happen in a fantasy.”