The Recovery Bill of Rights
is a statement of the principle that all Americans have a right to recover from addiction to alcohol and other drugs. Learn more…
Rally for Recovery! 2008
Start planning your 2008 Rally for Recovery! event. This year's Rally for Recovery will take place on September 20, 2008! Learn more...
Campaigns: Recovery Community Civic Engagement
Recovery Community Civic Engagement Campaign Kit
Growing numbers of recovery community organizations and recovery advocates across the country are getting involved in nonpartisan voting activities so that their voices can be heard in the local, state and national arenas. They are conducting voter registration and Get-Out-The-Vote activities, sponsoring candidate forums and getting candidates for political office on record about critical policies that will make recovery a reality for even more Americans.
Faces & Voices of Recovery’s nonpartisan Recovery Community Civic Engagement Campaign is one part of our national movement to make it possible for even more of our friends, neighbors and family members to experience long-term recovery from addiction by building recognition of the recovery community as a constituency of consequence. As recovery community organizations and recovery advocates register voters, educate candidates for public office about key issues and turn out voters in growing numbers, we will have an even greater impact on the lives of people who still need help with their addiction, people in long-term recovery, their family members and communities.
With less than half of eligible Americans voting, the Recovery Community Civic Engagement Campaign is a great way to help people take the first step in civic participation and build your recovery community organization. Civic engagement also allows us to increase the visibility of the growing addiction recovery advocacy constituency and the issues that we care about. Faces & Voices of Recovery’s Right to Addiction Recovery Platform describes those critical issues at greater length. Every individual eligible to vote needs to be encouraged to register to vote and, if already registered, encouraged to vote.
One policy issue that is very important to the recovery community is restoring the right of people with criminal convictions to vote. More than five million Americans are barred from the polls because of these restrictions. Many of these disenfranchised people have experience with addiction and face lifetime bans on participating in our civic life as voters. Recovery community organizations around the country are working in coalition with allied organizations to right this wrong. To find out more about this issue and how you can get involved in these efforts, take a look at our Webinar on Restoring Voting Rights to People with Drug Convictions.
Join us in reaching out and organizing the recovery community to participate in our electoral process. For more information, you can use the resources listed in appendix I of the campaign kit.
To assist in your Recovery Community Civic Engagement Campaign, Faces & Voices has a new button that says “We Recover and We Vote” and a bumper sticker that says “Another Voter for Recovery!”
Join us in engaging the recovery community in exercising our right to vote!
We gratefully acknowledge the work of Faces & Voices supporter and advocate Jean A. Walker in preparing these materials and are grateful to NCADD-New Jersey and The Wellstone Action Fund for allowing the use and adaptation of some of their materials.
Recovery Community Civic Engagement Campaign Kit
Getting Started
Non-Partisan Voter Registration
Get-Out-The-Vote Activities
Keeping it Non-Partisan: Civic Engagement
Appendix A
Appendix B
Appendix C
Appendix D
Appendix E
Appendix F
Appendix G
Appendix H
Appendix I