One of NYRA’s newest chapters, NYRA-Nanuet: Teen Suffrage Organization, is based out of a middle school in New York, and is NYRA’s only currently active middle school-based chapter. The chapter’s primary goal, according to chapter president Jackie Ferro, is to lower the voting age to 16. NYRA-Nanuet already has about 25 members, and has garnered some positive press attention in local news outlets, including an interview on the Regional News Network, a cable news channel broadcast throughout nothern New Jersey, western Connecticut and southwestern New York.
Ferro plans to gain the support of local government leaders in order to advance the cause of youth suffrage. The chapter vice president, Jessica Kroner, has contacted the area’s state assembly representative about lowering the voting age, and chapter representatives have been in contact with other local and state government officials as well. “The greatest thing about our nation,” Ferro says, “is that our founding fathers knew it was imperfect but they made ways for us to fix and improve it.” Ferro believes that youth are mature enough to have a say on issues that directly affect them. “We are working for the basic rights that we should already have.”
