By Avery Bleichfeld
August 15, 2024
Ron Bell may not be a pastor, but ahead of the service at the Greater Love Tabernacle Church Aug. 11, he delivered his own sermon to the congregation with a call to action: Register to vote.
It’s a message he’s used to delivering. Bell’s organization, Dunk the Vote, has been leading voter registration efforts in Boston since the group’s founding in 1992.
Now, with a state preliminary election approaching Sept. 3 and the presidential election in November, Bell is sharing his message again — in crunch time as the registration deadline for the preliminary election is approaching on Aug. 24.
Much of the work Dunk the Vote does has a local bent to it. Bell pointed to the ability of local officials to have a role in fixing things like potholes and quality of life issues or moderating things like local law enforcement.
“It’s the small things that we realized we needed to bring into the community,” Bell said.
City and state elections are the ones that, broadly, tend to have a greater day-to-day role in the life of voters, said Dawn Duncan, who is a senior advisor for the group and whose organization Circle of Nations, Inc. serves as the fiscal sponsor of Dunk the Vote.
“You voting actually can make an impact on the things that happen downtown,” Duncan said. “The people who you elect are responsible for those kinds of day-to-day services that impact your life.”
But that work faces additional challenges — it’s often harder to get voters to the polls for state and municipal elections.