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The Boston Sunday Globe
November 30, 2003, Sunday, Ideas, p. D11.

Educating Hub youth on voting

By Maria Padilla, 11/30/2003

On Nov. 4, 2003, I left my home in Jamaica Plain during the mid-afternoon after getting home from another hectic day of high school. A slight drizzle was falling as I walked toward the local JFK School, the voting place in my neighborhood. All day, I had been feeling anxious, so much that I hadn’t eaten lunch. Having just celebrated my 18th birthday, I was going to vote in a City of Boston election for the first time in my life. My nerves continued to act up as I entered the voting area, terrified that I wouldn’t know what to do. However, a poll worker approached me, explained in my native Spanish language the voting process, and I was able to cast my votes for City Council candidates without a problem.

I knew exactly which candidates I would vote for. I had been part of a youth community organizing team that had helped organize a candidates forum several weeks before the election. I had studied each candidate carefully. I noticed who answered questions and who avoided them. I focused on those who were truthful and spoke about the issues that I cared about, particularly issues related to children and teens.

Growing up in the Hyde/Jackson Square area of Jamaica Plain, I feel I lost a part of my childhood. Instead of having a carefree life and playing outside, like all children deserve, I was often full of fear. I was scared of the drug dealer who tried to give me a zip-lock bag full of drugs when I was 9. I was scared at age 10 when I watched the news one night with my aunt and we learned that my 18-year-old cousin had been shot to death in a random drive-by shooting. And I was terrified at the age of 11 when I was constantly sexually harassed by thugs as I walked to the corner variety store.

Because of the dangerous streets, I was forced to always be indoors, feeling like I was trapped in a cage. I was cheated out of my freedom throughout my childhood. When I did leave the house, my mind was often occupied with thoughts of whether I would survive or not.

I don’t want my younger cousins growing up in fear and caged like I was. In fact, I don’t want any children in Jamaica Plain, Roxbury, or any neighborhood in Boston growing up scared. This is why I got involved in politics, voting, and community organizing.

As an elected member of the Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Council, and as a community organizer with the Hyde Square Task Force, I now spend my time learning organizing skills, fighting for a new youth center in Jackson Square, and more funding for after-school programs. I also do phone-banking and door-knocking around election time to get people out to vote so politicians take people in my neighborhood seriously.

But not enough people are voting. Only about 25 percent of Boston voters came out in the recent city election. Once I found out how easy it is to vote, I don’t understand why more people don’t go to the polls. Our city has to take a careful look at how to get more people involved in voting. One idea we should consider is lowering the voting age to 17. Imagine if the Election Department and the School Department in Boston worked together. All Boston Public Schools students could register to vote at their high schools when they turn 17 and begin to develop the habit of voting.

Important city policy issues could be incorporated into the high school curriculum, and candidates forums could take place in every Boston high school auditorium. Maybe politicians would pay more attention to youth in the public schools if thousands of us were voting. If Boston leaders are sincere about wanting to increase the participation in voting, they will work to explore this idea and any other creative ideas that will bring more of us to the polls.

For me, voting was a very powerful event. I felt privileged to have such a great responsibility and I intend on making it a lifelong habit. I hope that thousands of other young people in Boston will also develop this habit soon.

Maria Padilla is a senior at Boston Community Leadership Academy, an elected member of the Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Council, and a youth community organizer with the Hyde Square Task Force Inc., a nonprofit partner of the Boston Globe Foundation.

This story ran on page D11 of the Boston Globe on 11/30/2003.
© Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company.