Spring Wrap Up
August 24, 2023
And just like that we’re over halfway through summer!
Here’s our late, but great spring highlights, as part of our quarterly series sharing our top highlights from each season.
Youth Vote Interns
In coordination with School Board Elections and building off our legislative work to pass pre-voter registration for 16 and 17 year olds, we ran our peer-to-peer voter registration program across 18 high schools in Oregon, hiring 18 interns to make class raps and pre-register their peers.
UPTURN
We expanded our UPTURN program which is now open to 60 youth participants per session. We did this through consultation work with AORTA that led to redesigning UPTURN curriculum and building in new accessible facilitation techniques for Next Up organizers.
Read more about our youth leadership programs and internship opportunities.
Regional Transportation Listening Sessions
Collaborating with Metro, we hosted two listening sessions focused specifically on youth feedback for the 2023 Regional Transportation Plan (RTP). We had 39 total participants, with the median age of 22. The top themes identified within the RTP centered accessibility, removing cost barriers for all transit riders, and emphasized safety and community wellbeing for transit riders without more policing.
Two Priority Bills Pass in the 2023 Legislative Session
We’re ecstatic to announce that two of Next Up Action Fund’s priority bills, Expanding Automatic Voter Registration and Ranked Choice Voting, passed during the 2023 legislative session which ended in June. We sit on the steering committee for ranked choice voting, and co-managed the first launch of the campaign in 2021. For Ranked Choice Voting, this is a historic win not only for Oregon but also nationwide! RCV (HB 2004) is the first statewide ranked choice voting legislation to pass out of a legislative chamber across the United States.
Read more about our 2023 Legislative Session here.
Legislative Happy Hour
More than 75 people joined us for tamales, drinks, community-building, and a raffle, as well as to hear our recap of our legislative and electoral work. It was great to be able to thank our partners and supporters, announce our move to a new office, and share our accomplishments with our community.
Youth-Led School Board Endorsements
To align with School Board Elections, we recruited and facilitated a paid, endorsement committee who helps shape our endorsement decisions. Our committee was made up of our high school base members, staff, and board members with a focus on Black, Indigenous, Youth of Color and intersectional youth having full leadership and decision making power. We endorsed 16 Candidates across 5 counties and 1 Ballot Measure for Multnomah County.
May Election Impact
Based on endorsements, we outlined and executed a field plan that prioritizes values-aligned people that are under 35 years old and that are Black, Indigenous, Latine, Asian and Pacific Islander, queer and trans, disabled, low income, and from oppressed communities. Focusing on candidates in Multnomah, Washington, Clackamas, Lane and Linn Counties. We hired 8 Election Organizers who made 32,601 calls and knocked 867 doors.
