The Campbell Reporter

News

Campbell residents ramping up for primaries

By Cathy Weselby

Preparations are building for the California presidential primary on Feb. 5, and Campbell residents are getting charged up. Orchard City volunteers from both parties are working hard to get out the vote for their candidate of choice.

Santa Clara County Republican Party executive director Carol Morrison says Rudy Giuliani's team is the most active in the county and is the only campaign with paid staff. She added that Mitt Romney's campaign has a lot of dedicated volunteers and Ron Paul's campaign is very active in the Bay Area.

"The county party is pleased," Morrison says. "We're seeing a whole group of new people in this election, including more working professionals and more young people."

The under-30 crowd is expected to vote in higher numbers this year. In Iowa, youth turnout increased from 4 percent in 2004 to 13 percent in 2008, and in New Hampshire, the number of voters under 30 rose from 18 percent in 2004 to 43 percent in 2008, according to a study by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement.

Campbell resident Isaac Kight is volunteering for the Giuliani campaign. Kight is a member of the Silicon Valley Young Republicans and owns a credit-counseling business. He says he's been volunteering in California politics since he was in high school and has been a Giuliani supporter since 1993.

"He represents a new age of the Republican Party," he says. "He's fiscally conservative and progressive on social issues."

Kight has been industriously calling 100 registered voters a week and speaking at events for groups such as the Conservative Forum and the Taxpayers Association.

"The phone banks are the mainstay," he says. "We've been asking voters who are voting for another GOP candidate if they would consider Giuliani as a second choice."

Silicon Valley Young Republicans president Theri Rowen works in Campbell and volunteers for the Mitt Romney campaign.

"He doesn't follow a script," says Rowen about Romney. "He's also the first Republican candidate to organize a health-care program."

Rowen says she admires Romney's self-reliance, as well as his wife's ability to cope with multiple sclerosis.

Rowen, 24, became involved in politics in high school during the 2000 presidential campaign.

She's planning an event on Jan. 29 at Mountain Mike's Pizza in Campbell for people to learn more about Romney's views and watch the results of the Florida primary.

"It's a way to get people involved in the Republican Party while doing something fun," she says.

At the other end of the age and political spectrum, Elaine Coombs, 76, is the Campbell area coordinator for the Barack Obama campaign in the 15th Congressional District.

Coombs has been pounding the pavement in Campbell, engaging voters in conversation about the candidate.

"I think he's the leader who can find a common ground and bridge the gap between people who don't agree," Coombs says.

Coombs says that a lot of people she's spoken with say their sons and daughters are supporting Obama. Coombs plans to step up her canvassing efforts closer to the Feb. 5 primary date.

Campbell-based life coach Vicci Smith is also volunteering on the Obama campaign. She says it's the first political campaign she's worked on, but she is no stranger to the process. Smith grew up watching her mother volunteer at polling places.

Smith has been calling registered voters and traveled to Nevada and knocked on doors the weekend of the state's Jan. 19 caucus.

She became an Obama supporter after hearing him speak at the 2004 Democratic convention, during a time when the country was talking about red states and blue states.

He said, "We're not the red states or the blue states, we're the United States of America."

Campbell City Councilman Evan Low, 24, is volunteering for the John Edwards campaign. Low traveled to Nevada to knock on doors and ask people to vote for Edwards.

Low is supporting Edwards because he favors Edwards' positions on universal health care, ending the war in Iraq and Social Security reform.

"I think Edwards has the ability to bring the country together," Low says. "We need to think beyond party lines because there are a lot of voters in Campbell who are registered independents or decline to state a party, and these are nonpartisan issues."

The presidential primary election is Feb. 5. For more information, or to find your polling place online, visit www.sccvote.org.