Case Study: Providing Access to Voter Data
Each year, nonprofits and volunteer groups across the state of Connecticut engage in “get out the vote” efforts, which include encouraging eligible citizens to register to vote and encouraging registered voters to vote. However, these groups often have limited resources for “GOTV” activities, and when looking at a city such as Hartford, knowing where it might be most helpful to focus those limited resources can be a challenge.
In Hartford, the Hartford Votes-Hartford Votas Coalition members hoped to address that challenge.
Through a participatory engagement design, CTData partnered with the Hartford Votes Coalition to identify the data that would be most helpful for these groups and to produce a data story and dashboard that these groups could use in their GOTV efforts, engaging the GOTV groups throughout. This work was also funded by the BSL Education Foundation and is built on the work we began in 2020 with our GOTV grant.
Why This Project
While much voter data is available, few identify “where we live” by our voting district or state or federal representative. Besides town-level, these geographies are the only way that the reported data is made available. While this is helpful for the state and local officials at an administrative level, it is not applicable for people doing the hard work of registering and encouraging voting.
By processing and geocoding the Secretary of the State’s Voter File, we have made data available that shows the number of people registered in a specific geographic area – a particular street or block in Hartford – to help people know where their efforts may be most needed. Hartford Votes and their partners saw that this data had the potential to fill this gap and collaborated with us to ensure that the voices of those who needed the data could contribute to the project.
Identifying the Questions
With funding from the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving Get Out the Vote grant program, the Hartford Votes Coalition organized gatherings of the grantees of this program. They coordinated to bring over 10 groups together, which included:
Their goal was to coordinate, share information and resources, and support one another as they all worked collectively to increase voter turnout in Hartford.
CTData joined these sessions and facilitated conversations to identify the data that would be most useful in their GOTV efforts, and to choose the questions that CTData would explore through our data story.
In the first session, we asked participants to discuss:
Who are you focusing your GOTV efforts on?
What questions do you have about voters in Hartford?
Through these discussions and the discussion of the entire session, we developed six potential questions that people would like to know. Our staff then met and looked at these questions and the data that we had available to us and narrowed the project down to two questions. In the second session, CTData presented these questions to the group and asked them to identify specific data within these questions that would be helpful. The questions and data points were narrowed to:
Where are the neighborhoods in Hartford where the turnout of registered voters was high or low in the 2019 municipal election? (Data source: Secretary of the State Voter File)
What are the demographic characteristics of the neighborhoods that could help understand how best to conduct outreach to that neighborhood? (Source: Census)
Question one could help grantees focus their efforts physically – where to send vans to transport people to polling locations and where to set up registration sites to increase registration in a neighborhood. Question two could be used by groups who were focusing on specific populations. For example, a group focusing on increasing the registration of Hispanic/Latino citizens could explore other demographic characteristics that might aid their outreach efforts.
Developing the Data Stories
Once we had the questions, we worked on developing the tools for participants. Through analysis, our data team realized that because of how participants talked about using the demographic data – to focus on specific populations and neighborhoods they work with – it would be more helpful to create an interactive dashboard than one story with one narrative. This would allow each organization to explore the data with their questions.
Data Story: Voting Behavior in the 2019 Municipal Election
For this story, we cleaned and geocoded the Secretary of the State’s Voter File to create a dataset of voters from the 2019 municipal election by Hartford Neighborhood. The sub-questions we explored for this story were:
What was the participation of currently registered Hartford residents during the previous municipal election (2019)?
What share of residents in the neighborhoods voted in that election? How does that differ by age group?
In which neighborhoods have residents voted at higher rates and lower rates?
We provided maps and charts about those who are currently registered in Hartford and who voted in the 2019 election. This gave GOTV groups information to help them encourage voters in the areas where they are invested.
Hartford Neighborhood Voter Explorer Dashboard
For the dashboard, we focused on the demographics of the Hartford neighborhoods by combining the Voter File and 2021 5-year American Community Survey data. We created a Hartford neighborhood to census tract crosswalk to compile the data by neighborhood. We presented data by neighborhood on voter participation, percent earning above the poverty line, share renting versus owning homes, and more.
Data Walk to Hone the Data Story
Now that we had done the preliminary analysis, we needed to hear from the GOTV groups about what they saw in the data that would be important to include in the Data Story. As part of one of the convenings, we hosted a 40-minute data walk. Our goals were to 1) increase the ability to read the charts we were creating and 2) hear from those who live in the neighborhoods about what they saw in the data. During the session, we facilitated discussions and took notes. After the Data Walk, our team met and discussed integrating these ideas into the final Data Story. (Here is the PowerPoint from the session, and the agenda is here.)
Training on Utilizing the Tools
The final step of this project was ensuring that people who needed the data knew how to utilize the data tools we had created. During one of the Hartford Votes monthly meetings, we presented the tools and did a walk-through of how to use them. The session was recorded and shared with those who could not join.
Challenges and What’s Next?
This project provided data to assist registration and education for the November 2023 election. However, the timeline and the commitment of the Hartford Votes Coalition to participatory engagement meant that this project could only be made live about a month before the election. We also have a list of essential questions that GOTV groups feel are important but that we need more time to explore in 2023. We hope that in 2024 we can engage some of these questions.
For More Information
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