Dear friend,
Your gift matters to Kiah.
Kiah started with Forward Montana Foundation as a Bozeman Field Organizer in 2013, and then stepped up her game as our Eastern Montana Program Director. She uses the skills she learned those years in her current position as Deputy Director, now just while also overseeing dozens of staff with enthusiasm and grace.
When asked about why the youth vote matters, Kiah says, “The system is set up to be complicated & burdensome — so complicated & burdensome that it prevents us from showing up and making our voices and our values heard.
“In the face of these barriers, Forward Montana Foundation plays the crucial role of navigator and interpreter for new and young voters, ensuring that they can prevail in making their voices heard at the ballot box, in the capital, and in the streets.”
Together, we mobilized thousands of young voters during the midterm election. With your help:
- Kiah, along with dozens of other staff and volunteers, registered over 7,791 voters and made over 79,477 calls and texts to remind young voters to get out to the polls.
- We expanded our “Underage Democracy” high school programming to 11 new high school classrooms, from Missoula to Havre, tackling barriers to participation earlier than any other civic organization.
- We’re transforming youth culture around voting in Montana. We’ve developed important partnerships with Patagonia and Logjam Presents, making voting as cool as scaling a mountain or attending a killer concert.
- We led the charge on key Election Protection work, including moving a polling location back to MSU’s campus, and saw staggering record turnout that changed the course of this election.
We’re excited to keep the momentum going straight into the Montana legislative session and beyond to 2020. We’re investing in our leaders and ensuring that they have the tools they need to make real change, and to do that we need to have $12,2560 in the bank for our 2019 internships before the session starts on January 7th.
Can we count on you to help give the next generations of “Kiahs” an opportunity to grow?
With thanks,
Jeremy Osborn
Forward Montana Foundation Board Chair
P.S. We know that strong grassroots movements are grown from grassroots dollars. From now until December 31st, each contribution will be matched dollar for dollar by the Kendeda Foundation.