PRIYA CHATWANI

The Voter Empowerment Project (VEP) is a volunteer-led initiative that mobilizes individuals to support voter turnout in high-need areas. Our volunteer network provides remote technical assistance to small, high-impact, BIPOC-led groups that organize voter registration, voter education, and other activities to historically disadvantaged communities.

My aunt connected me to Dave, the founder of VEP, in November 2019, and I was inspired by his mission to partner with grassroots, front-line voting rights organizations beacuse they are most in touch with the needs of their community.

As a founding organizer and the project manager of all technical tasks, my evolving roles and responsibilities include:

• onboarding 200+ volunteers and introducing them to our work and mission,
• matching volunteers to partner tasks based on availability, skill set, and experience,
• building and maintaining the Voter Empowerment Project website,
• managing and overseeing all volunteers with technical skills, a team of about 50,
• managing all technical tasks, which included website design, website development, search engine optimization, & custom voter pledge cards,
• meeting with prospective and current partners to discuss VEP's goals and technical projects,
• forming a partnership with VoteAmerica and embedding their tools on partner websites.

With Covid-19, our work became increasingly important as we helped our partners create and sustain an engaging online presence. And the work continues with the upcoming runoff in Georgia!