The District of Columbia will have a primary election on June 14, 2016. The deadline to register with the DC Board of Elections (DCBOEE) to vote in the primary election is May 15th. Are you one of the over 400,000 DC residents registered to vote?

To be eligible to register as a voter in DC you must:

• Be a United States Citizen
• Be a resident of the District of Columbia
• Be at least 16 years old (District residents may preregister to vote at age 16, but will not receive a voter registration card or be eligible to vote until they are at least 17 with a date of birth indicating that they will be 18 on or before the next general election.)
• Not be in jail on a felony conviction
• Not have been found by a court to be legally incompetent to vote
• Not claim voting residence outside of the District of Columbia

You can register via e-mail by completing online information on the DCBOEE website. You can also pick up a voter application to complete at the DCBOEE office (441 4th Street NW), any Department of Motor Vehicles branch office, any DC Public Library (call the branch you are going to to confirm they have them available), or police station (the 5th District at 1805 Bladensburg Road is the closest to Trinidad). You will need to complete the application and mail it to the DCBOEE or drop it off in their offices. There is also a Vote4DC app for phones and tablets for electronic voter registration and election information.

The current list of candidates for the June primary is in the linked file (nr_1786). While this will continue to be updated by DCBOEE, the current list will give an overview of what offices will be on the upcoming primary ballot.

In all of Ward 5 in the 2014 November election, only 37.5% of registered voters participated in the election. That’s a pretty low number. Trinidad is in 3 voting precincts (all of 77 and parts of 76 and 78). Those percentages were even lower at 21% participation in voting precinct 76, 33% participation in voting precinct 77, and 27% participation in voting precinct 78.

Register now to rock the DC votes in June and November of this year but actually turn out for the election day to make your votes matter!