Prospective Electors Steering to Minor Parties

Democrats are slipping. Republicans are barely holding their own. Yet minor political parties are on the upswing.

Flush with new recruits inspired by Texas millionaire Ross Perot and meditation guru Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, minor parties have attracted more than half of the new voters added to the rolls in Ventura County since June.

That’s when the nation adopted the “motor-voter” registration law, an effort by Democrats in Washington to swell the voter rolls with those citizens who never seem to take the first step toward exercising their constitutional right to vote.

Republicans fought against the federal law, which allows voter registration by mail and requires that forms be made available in motor vehicle and welfare offices. The Grand Old Party, whose members are more faithful voters, feared the rule changes would add mostly Democrats to the rolls.

So far, that has not been the case--at least in Ventura County.

“These new voters seem disenchanted with both major parties,” said county elections chief Bruce Bradley. “The Democrats are not attracting the new people. Republicans have also been doing poorly with new registrations.”

Of the 10,672 voters added to the county’s rolls since June, 51% have signed up with minor parties. Many of them were recruited during registration drives to qualify Perot’s new Reform Party for the official ballot and the Natural Law Party, which sprang from the Transcendental Meditation movement.

But the American Independent Party has also had a jump in registration, as has the category of voters who decline to state any party affiliation.

Looking at all newly registered voters, 75% have shunned the Republican and Democratic parties, Bradley pointed out. Despite this recent trend, the major parties continue to dominate the political landscape; together they make up 85% of the county’s 353,782 registered voters.

Robert L. Gallaway, chairman of the Ventura County Democratic Party, said he was not surprised that the newly registered voters would flock to minor parties or decline any party preference.

“When you are talking about signing up people at the Department of Motor Vehicles, you are picking up people who have been apathetic or not been involved in the political process,” he said. “I would expect a big jump in the decline-to-state” category.

Democratic activists have yet to launch their perennial voter-registration drive, Gallaway said. He expected the drive to begin soon by Democratic activists seeking signatures for a statewide ballot initiative that would raise the minimum wage from $4.25 to $5 an hour.

During the past six months, only 337 new voters joined the Democratic Party, although the overall number of registered Democrats dropped as names were purged from the active file because of deaths or because voters had moved away.

With the drop in party members, the Democrats slipped to less than 40% of the county’s registration for the first time in more than 50 years, Bradley said.

The Ventura County Democratic Party dominated local politics from 1936 to 1984, riding a surge in popularity that began in the Depression and lasted until Ronald Reagan sought his second term as President.

Democratic registration peaked at 60% of the county’s electorate in 1960 with the election of President John F. Kennedy. Since then, the party’s membership has been on a long slide that continues today.

Since eclipsing Democratic registration in 1984, Republicans have continued to hang onto their position of dominance with 43.5% of the county’s electorate. But the GOP picked up only 2,440, or about 23%, of the voters added to the county rolls since June.

“We are always registering voters,” said Karen Kurta, chairwoman of the Ventura County Republican Party. Some party activists, she said, have been signing up new voters while they collect signatures for the “California civil rights initiative,” a proposed statewide ballot measure that would abolish affirmative action.

The California Republican Party offers a bounty of $1.50 to $2 for each new Republican registration, Kurta said. It’s an incentive for local party activists to help swell their party’s ranks.

The state Democratic Party also offers a bounty, but it’s only $1, Gallaway said. Party activists can collect $1.25 per signature if a new registrant has a verifiable telephone number, Gallaway said.

Election officials are bracing for angry calls in March from those voters who switched their registration to help qualify the Reform Party for this year’s ballot.

Election chief Bradley expects some Reform Party members to be shocked to receive a sample ballot that is largely blank. The Reform Party decided not to field any local candidates and will not select its presidential nominee until a convention planned for later this year.

“They’ll be able to vote for judge and county supervisor and some ballot measures, but that’s it,” Bradley said.

Election officials expect some Reform Party members to re-register with the major parties so they can have more of a voice in the primary election March 26. The deadline for registering to vote in the March primary is Feb. 26.

Neither local nor state election officials are sure what long-term impact the federal motor-voter law will have on the composition or size of the local electorate.

But they expect the change to be substantially less than in some states, where voters are purged from the rolls if they fail to vote, or required to produce a picture identification to an election official before they can register.

California removed these barriers 20 years ago by allowing its citizens to register by mail. At the same time, local registrars discontinued dropping voters from the rolls for failing to show up on election day.

Instead, the practice has been to delete only those names that the U.S. Postal Service reports as having moved to a new address or those reported as deceased by health officials.

Under the federal law, those voters who have moved to a new address must be placed on an inactive list for four years before their names are deleted altogether.

In California, the major change caused by the motor-voter law, other than a substantial increase in record keeping, is to require the DMV to make voter registration part of the process of renewing driver’s licenses.

The American Civil Liberties Union expects this to bump up overall registrations by reaching people who would otherwise not have an opportunity to join the voter roles.

But Bradley is not sure how much higher registration will go in Ventura County, an affluent area where 81% of the county’s voting-age citizenry are already on the rolls.

Thus far, three out of four new registrations are coming through usual channels, such as signature drives and political activists pushing a party or a cause.

The remainder come from people renewing driver’s licenses. Bradley cannot tell how many of these voters are newcomers to the system who otherwise would not have found their way onto the voter rolls.

“I’m not sure if we are going to see a big crush of new voters,” he said.

Furthermore, Bradley questioned whether these voters will actually make it to the polls on election day. He predicted that more than half of the registered voters will not bother to vote in the March 26 primary, as has been the case in past presidential primaries.

“We may be getting people on file, who, if left to their own devices, they would never register,” Bradley said. “It is easy to get people to register to vote, but it’s another matter to get them to vote.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Voter Registration

Monday, Feb. 26, is the last day to register to vote in the March 26 primary election.

Who may register:

You must be a U.S. citizen, at least 18 years old on or before election day, and a California resident for 29 days before the election. If you move within 28 days before the election, you may vote by returning to your former precinct or by obtaining an absentee ballot for that precinct.

Reasons to register or re-register:

* If you have never registered to vote.

* If you have moved since the last election.

* If you have changed your name.

* If you want to change your party affiliation.

How and where to register:

* Mail-in voter registration forms are available at county offices, city halls, fire stations, post offices, libraries and the state Department of Motor Vehicles. Voters can also call the Ventura County Elections Division office at 654-2781. The office is at 800 S. Victoria Ave. in the lower plaza of the Hall of Administration. Office hours are 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays.

* Absentee ballots: Applications are on the back page of your sample ballot. They may also be obtained in person or by sending a written request to the Elections Division, County Government Center, 800 S. Victoria Ave., Ventura, 93009. Written applications must be received between Feb. 26 and March 19. You can obtain an absentee ballot in person at the elections office between Feb. 16 and March 26, with the option of immediately casting your ballot in the office.

Source: Ventura County Elections Division