A Black Lives Matter protest on Evansville’s riverfront Sunday had a new twist- voter registration.
Anger and action.
The Black Lives Matter protests in Evansville this summer are giving way to voter registration in the fall.
“Are you registered?” A volunteer makes the rounds of those attending a rally at the Four Freedoms monument Sunday afternoon, asking the question, ready to point anyone who says they're not registered to vote to a nearby table.
Something else that makes these events different from the summer protests are the ages of the organizers. Leslie Martin is a senior at Central High School and a volunteer for the national organization, My School Votes. Martin says,
“I focus on seventeen year olds who will be eighteen by November, and eighteen year olds in general.”
Serya Baltzell and Emani Marks both attend Harrison High School.
“We’re seniors. We’re busy, we have jobs, we have lives. But, nobody else is standing up for us, so, it’s our time, it’s our fight, we are the future.”
By the end of Sunday’s protest and voter registration, the organizers were talking with Evansville City Council President Alex Burton about making it a weekly event.