President’s Update – September 2026

Dawn Smith, President

It’s almost fall, friends (although it’s 80 degrees outside as I type this), and that means

General Election season is right around the corner.

I like to encourage our committees to take it a little bit easy over summer. We spend all

winter inside; summer is a time to get outside and spend time with your families. And,

while many of our committees took a break from meeting over the summer, this is the

busiest summer for the League I can remember. Our presence in the community was

outstanding, with our attendance at Juneteenth, Pride, the GBAPS Back to School

event and our Voting Rights Amendment Proclamation, which was attended by both the

Mayor and the County Executive.

At these events, we added over 50 new people to our newsletter, and we now have over 1200 followers on the Facebook page. Most importantly, our members had the opportunity to speak, one-on-one, to community members about voting. Sometimes the world we live in feels surreal, but summers like this remind me that WE ARE MAKING A DIFFERENCE.

To everyone who was able to attend the Annual Picnic on August 6, it was great to see

you! As usual, ADRC was an awesome partner for us, and it is always lovely to get

to catch up with everyone.

Before I sign off, there are a couple people I need to thank. First and foremost, Lynn

Meshke has been an absolute rock star this summer – from arranging our tables at

Pride and Juneteenth, writing and coordinating everything for the proclamation, putting

together the education-specific lit for the GBEA union, and currently putting together the referendum video. Lynn’s work is moving us forward, and I want to be sure and call that out.

I also want to thank H. Smet from Migration Advocacy for being our guest speaker at the

picnic, and Denise Gaumer Hutchison for making all the arrangements for the picnic, even though she couldn’t attend. And thank you to all our members who volunteered to table at the events we participated in. YOU ARE THE LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS!

Finally, given the move from a fiscal year to calendar year, we decide to move Lively

Issues up from February to October to give our committees the opportunity to really

make use of the feedback we collect from our members. Mark your calendars for Saturday,

October 17, for our 2027 Lively issues. Details to follow.