Take the Next Step in Encouraging Civic Engagement: Offer Paid Time Off for Staff to Vote and Serve as Poll Workers

Thank you to the National Council of Nonprofits for sharing this message on National Voter Registration Day:

Today is the tenth annual National Voter Registration Day! We hope many of you are celebrating by holding voter information and registration events.

Helping our communities register to vote is a service to them and to our democracy, but let’s not forget about our own staff members.

For National Voter Registration Day, we invite you to join us in taking a few quick, but important, actions:

  • Encourage your staff to be #VoteReady by quickly checking and confirming their voter eligibility. If they have moved or changed their name since the last election, they may need to update their record to be eligible to vote in November.
     
  • Ensure your employees can exercise their right to vote by providing paid time off for voting – during early voting and/or on Election Day.
     
  • Go even further by allowing paid time off for your employees to serve as nonpartisan poll workers. Even before the events of the past couple years, it was be a challenge finding enough people to staff polling places. Now, with lingering concerns about the pandemic and threats of disruptions, it may be even harder to fill these vital roles. Help make it easier to staff every polling place, so every person can vote. 
     
  • Not sure how to get started? Feel free to use the National Council of Nonprofits’ policy as a template to adapt for your organization. Additional samples are available from Nonprofit Staff Vote. (As always, we recommend running any new or updated policy by counsel to ensure compliance with federal, state, and local laws.)
     
  • If you already have a policy in place on voting and working the polls, highlight it with your staff today. Almost no one (HR staff included) remembers every policy that an organization has in place. Make sure your staff members know they can take the time to participate in our democratic process!

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