Voting Rights work in Louisville over the weekend

KFTC's members attended today's Rally for Recovery in Louisville, hosted by PAR (People Advocating Recovery).  It's an annual event organized by people in long term recovery from addiction to alcohol and other drugs, their families, and friends with the goal of building community and reducing the negative perceptions associated with addiction recovery.  It has been PAR's experience that the road to recovery is filled with obstacles that hinder reintegration into society and one of those obstacles is felony disenfranchisement.  Kentucky is one of just a handful of states where if someone is convicted of a felony, even something not serious enough to warrant one day in jail in some cases, they lose the right to vote for the rest of their lives unless given the right to vote back by a governor's pardon.  

That's not right.  We think that all people should be allowed to vote and at the least, former felons ought to be given the right to vote back after they've served their debty to society.  

KFTC members were on hand at today's event to help people who could to register to vote and we circulated petitions to lawmakers to restore voting rights to former felons who have served their debt to society.

In all, we got nearly 300 petition signatures and several voter registrations, plus we connected with several key ally organizations and former felons who are willing to tell their stories to move this issue forward.

In related news, superstar KFTC member Aubrey Clemons from Jefferson County is featured on a site for people who don't have a right to vote, asking others to vote for them.  Aubrey has a felony in his past and the video shows his having a conversation about his son about it.

Check it out and consider pleging to vote on Aubrey's behalf.