With Dignity, Hope, and Promise of a Voice
It’s easier than ever to vote in Ann Arbor
—By Cody Jonaitis
The air was just beginning to chill with the first touches of fall and although there was nearly a month yet to go, the election was inescapable. Campaign advertisements were everywhere, fundraising notices congesting email inboxes, and candidate signs and stickers peppered almost every available surface. This was my first time voting in a presidential election, and in fact, my first time voting at all. Navigating the maze of construction projects that seem to be a staple in Ann Arbor, I slipped on my mask emblazoned with the distinctive block “M” and headed toward the University of Michigan Museum of Art.
Almost immediately I was asked to swipe my MCard and was sent to wait my place in line, socially-distanced of course. The coronavirus was more pervasive than the election and the whole voting process was centered around COVID safety. When I finally reached the front, I was directed to a volunteer who, seated behind a conspicuous plexiglass barrier, handed me an absentee ballot and ubiquitous “I Voted” sticker. Following the arrows on the floor, I took my ballot to an individual booth and carefully followed the directions printed on the outside of the envelope. After completing my selections, I made my way out of the UMMA, slipping my ballot into the drop box conspicuously positioned next to the door.
The Student Vote
As heard so often in recent weeks, the United States is commonly billed as the world’s oldest representative democracy with our free and fair elections being what make us distinct. The 2020 election cycle was the 59th one of its kind, but for many reasons it felt completely different. Occurring in the midst of a global pandemic, an economic recession, and a period of national unrest, it seemed to become almost existential. Americans voted in record numbers, casting nearly 160 million ballots. In Michigan alone more than 5.5 million votes were cast, another record and the highest percentage of the voting age population since the election of JFK in 1960.
Historically however, the political engagement among younger and college age voters has been particularly low. Fortunately, University of Michigan Stamps School of Art & Design professors Stephanie Rowden and Hannah Smotrich are working hard to change that. They are the forces behind the Creative Campus Voting Project, a multiyear effort to increase student voter turnout that culminated in the installation of the UMMA satellite clerk’s office. They were driven by a simple idea: “we had a hunch, and research has proved it so, that most college students really want to vote,” Professor Rowden explains, “They’re new voters and it’s a really confusing process and that’s where we think art and design has a lot to offer.”
Building Blocks
Introducing the Creative Campus Voting Project in 2018, Professors Rowden and Smotrich began by addressing one of the main obstacles facing college voters at Michigan: eligibility and application for absentee voting. During the 2018 midterm cycle they launched the “Voting is Sexy” campaign, a series of creative projects aimed at making voting more visible, less confusing, and more appealing to U-M students. Following the success of this effort, they began to look ahead toward the 2020 presidential election, experimenting with how they might “add to the ecosystem of voter engagement efforts by using art and design.”
They were significantly aided by the passing of ballot Proposal 3 during the 2018 midterms. This measure was aimed at expanding voting rights in several key ways, notably including automatic voter registration, same- day voter registration, and no-excuse absentee voting. This paved the way for the implementation of the satellite clerk’s office in the UMMA, a culmination of several of their goals. “The idea of creating more fun, social, connective community building works with a lot of participatory art practice,” Professor Smotrich elaborates, “this idea of kind of placemaking really came together in relation to the UMMA office in particular.” They worked on this project in collaboration with several units at U-M, including Turn Up Turnout, the Ginsberg Center, and the U-M Office of Government Relations, but they especially credit their success to the partnership with the Ann Arbor City Clerk’s Office. “We were very fortunate to have a clerk who is so invested in making sure college students have access to vote” said Professor Rowden of Ann Arbor City Clerk Jacqueline Beaudry.
Creating an Accessible Space
The first of its kind in the state, the satellite clerk’s office allowed students the opportunity to register to vote, apply for an absentee ballot, and submit that ballot all in one place. One of the biggest hurdles Professors Rowden and Smotrich faced in the implementation of this project was simply in finding a suitable space. They had explored several spaces on campus but, as Professor Smotrich explains, once the idea for utilizing the Stenn gallery in the UMMA was introduced they were “100% on the UMMA train.” She describes that “It just was so perfect for so many of the things we had been thinking about in our other projects around visibility and transparency, accessibility and centrality,” further explaining that “it was the perfect manifestation of so many of the traits that make it easy and possible and fun and delightful for students to engage in the process.”
The coronavirus pandemic has affected nearly every aspect of our lives and this project was certainly no different. COVID-19 created many barriers to the implementation of the clerk’s office, including constraints such as limits on location, capacities on how many people were allowed in the space, and even which doors they were able to use. Throughout the process Professors Rowden and Smotrich were focused on keeping people safe and emphasized that “our motto was ‘nimble’, right, everything had to be nimble.” However, they point out that in some ways, without the pandemic this project wouldn’t have been nearly as successful. Noting that “those constraints really do become productive motivators in many ways,” the national effort to encourage mail-in voting played a key factor in this process, as well as the simple fact that the Museum gallery space would not have been available.
Keeping in mind their mission around “what kind of role art and design can play in terms of energizing civic activity,” Professor Rowden describes that “voting is a beautiful act and it’s wonderful to have it in a beautiful space.” The UMMA satellite office lines up with the ideals of the democratic process in several key ways: visibility, transparency, and clarity. Notably, the Stenn gallery itself is a glass enclosure that is uniquely visible to passersby, allowing the large slogan of “Register. Request a Ballot. VOTE early” to be emblazoned on the wall and draw in students. Although initially reluctant to put the office in such a unique space, City Clerk Jacqueline Beaudry is credited by Professors Rowden and Smotrich for her faith in their vision, noting that “at the end of the day she sort of looked at us and she said ‘you guys seem so sure and so excited, let’s go for it’.”
Looking Ahead
While full evaluations of the effectiveness and impact of the UMMA satellite clerk’s office have yet to be compiled, all of the signs seem to be pointing toward good. Over the six week period that the clerk’s office was open, 5,412 people were registered to vote and 8,501 absentee ballots were cast at this location. Furthermore, Professors Rowden and Smotrich emphasize that this is just the start of their efforts and the satellite clerk’s office “has opened up an opportunity for all of us to see what’s actually possible.” They were extremely satisfied with the outcome and indicate that there is a lot of interest in continuing the project. Discussions around new ideas for the upcoming 2022 midterms have already begun and, while nothing is yet formalized, they mentioned the possibility of implementing a similar, scaled down version on North Campus.
This easy accessibility of voting is not something that we can take for granted, however. Only about five months out from election day there have already been 106 bills filed in 28 different states seeking to restrict access to the vote, with more sure to come. Many of these bills would add limits to mail-in voting, add additional voter ID requirements, and make it more difficult to register new voters. This is not to mention the massive post-election effort to invalidate the vote in several key states, including Michigan. Following the casting of votes by Michigan’s Presidential Electors, a significant push was made to avow that the presidential election results certified by Michigan officials were unconstitutional and thus de-certify those duly cast votes. Thankfully, this move was rejected by US District Judge Linda V. Parker on the grounds that if granted, it would “disenfranchise the votes of the more than 5.5 million Michigan citizens who, with dignity, hope, and a promise of a voice, participated in the 2020 General Election.” While such a motion was denied in this election cycle, who’s to say that such actions won’t be attempted again.
Because of this it falls on us, the People, to remain vigilant and engaged in our electoral processes. Professors Rowden and Smotrich remain optimistic, explaining their hope that “the ease and the welcome of that experience [ at the UMMA ] accompanies people who have maybe voted for the first time” and that the “experience will sort of travel with them.” While I can’t presume exactly what the future holds for voting in America, I can confidently say that I will never forget my experience in the UMMA that day and I will be voting again.
Featured Image: I Voted – Photo by Cody Jonaitis