Osgoode Visiting Professor Jamil Jivani and his Community Organizing and the Law class are stepping up their efforts to get more people in the Jane and Finch community to vote in the October 19 federal election.
“The next several days will be crazy with following up with voters,” Jivani said of the final push he and the students – participants in a non-partisan voter mobilization group Jivani created called Jane and Finch Votes – intend to make.
The Jane and Finch neighbourhood had the GTA’s lowest voter turnout in the last federal election, and Jivani’s group has been working hard knocking on doors to get more people to vote in this election. Their goal is to get 800 people to sign a pledge promising to vote.
A number of pledges were signed on October 8 when 100 to 150 people showed up at Westview Centennial Secondary School at 4 p.m. to hear Jivani talk about the importance of exercising their right to vote. Later, free Thanksgiving turkeys were given out to all those who had pledged to vote.
Jivani’s group then distributed the remaining turkeys at a couple of nearby community centres. “I think today’s Thanksgiving event was a great success,” Jivani said. “In total, we engaged hundreds of people and signed up around 150 to 200 people to vote.”