NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Next Tuesday's New York City Primary features highly publicized and hotly contested races for Mayor and Comptroller. Yet more than 300 other candidates are running for 64 open seats across the five boroughs. While New York’s scandal-plagued candidates dominate the headlines, undecided voters will need a better resource than headlines to make more informed choices.
That resource is PollVault.com. The non-partisan voter education site offers information on all of the candidates and races alongside more than 100 voter guides to help New Yorkers sort out their ballot picks quickly and confidently.
The goal is to make it easy for people to cast informed votes. "Very few voters — particularly young voters — go into the voting booth knowing everything they'll find on their ballot," said Andy Bernstein, executive director of HeadCount.org, which partnered with PollVault for the general election.
Visitors to PollVault enter in a zip code and the web app locates their borough-specific ballot. Adding a street address fully populates the voter's city council district and the local candidates running for that seat.
Voters are then prompted to select up to ten ballot "Advisors" from among interest groups, unions, and newspapers that have published endorsements. They may also be able to view their Facebook friends’ preferences and opinions. After reviewing the ballot advice of a custom lineup of trusted advisors, PollVault users can record and optionally share their own set of candidate choices.
"Our right to vote is so precious, yet we often leave that power on the table because we feel uninformed," said Nolan Love, PollVault Founder and Chief Engineer. "Social media's role in filling this information gap is inevitable."
Currently, PollVault is a self-funded venture and doesn't make money — the information visitors provide when filling out sample ballots will not be sold to campaigns or other organizations. Instead, the company says it intends to license its live polling data to newspapers and blogs.
Tuesday's Primary will come quickly. But PollVault can help NYC residents get advice from their most trusted sources within minutes. Voters can head to the polls with their PollVault ballot in a mobile browser or with a printed list of chosen candidates for easy reference.
About PollVault
PollVault is a non-partisan and not-for-profit crowd-polling effort organized around collaborative political decision-making. It is not biased toward any corporate sponsor, investor, or interest group.
