Shoe leather still the best sales tool for candidates

It was late-season T-shirt weather - "Pete Lee for State Senate" T-shirts, in this case.

Lee and a couple of volunteers were ringing doorbells in the Pleasant Valley neighborhood, north of Old Colorado City and south of Kissing Camels.

The volunteers were reporting in. "Will not vote for a Democrat," said Steve Cook, pointing to one of the names on his list.

They laughed. Lee is a Democrat, and the list is supposed to be of "persuadable" voters.

A few afternoons later, state Rep. Larry Liston was pounding the sun-drenched pavement in Venetian Village, the neighborhood north of Fillmore Street between Nevada Avenue and Union Boulevard. It was too nice out for Liston.

"If you go out on a dark, semi-drizzly day, you always get the sympathy vote," said Liston, a Republican who's running for re-election. "I kind of relish going out on days when it's not perfect."

Even in an era of Web sites, robo-calls and television and mail blitzes ahead of early voting, the personal appeal for votes is still the key to getting elected.

"The most effective get-out-the-vote effort is face-to-face, door-to-door contact," said Josh Dunn, a political science professor at the University of Colorado-Colorado Springs.

"It's sort of the gold standard of getting out the vote."

"This is a contact sport," Liston said. "The more contacts you make with people, the better you'll do."

Liston, a 56-year-old recently retired investment adviser, is seeking his third term as House District 16 representative. Centered on Palmer Park, it's a solidly Republican district in which Liston ran unopposed two years ago. This year's challenger, Rich Flores, has mounted a modest campaign.

Even so, Liston said he has visited all 56 precincts in his district this year.

Lee, a 60-year-old lawyer making his first run for public office, is a candidate in Senate District 12. It's an open seat, vacant because Republican state Sen. Andy McElhany is prevented by term limits from running again. Lee's opponent is Keith King, a veteran lawmaker who served eight years in the state House and is trying to move up to the Senate after being out of office since 2006 because of term limits.

There are about 63,000 voters in Senate District 12, and Lee said he or his volunteers had visited about 14,000 in the last year. Lee said he had walked well over 125 miles going door to door in the district. It starts in downtown Colorado Springs and spirals northwest through the Garden of the Gods area, circling around Manitou Springs and taking in most of the Broadmoor area, Fort Carson, Fountain and the southern approaches to the city.

"We identified areas where we thought there were what are called persuadable voters," he said. "There's like 85 precincts in Senate District 12, and we targeted, I think, 25 of them. And we have canvassed all 25 of those."

Candidates make use of voter databases. Liston said he had paid $1,500 to $2,000 this year for lists from Magellan Data and Mapping Strategies, a Louisville, Colo.-based outfit that is privately owned but popular with Republican candidates.

Lee's service is called the Voter Activation Network, which is maintained by the state Democratic Party. For a $400 subscription fee, he can download customized lists of Democrats and unaffiliated voters, plus others whose voting histories might make them "persuadable."

What happens inside a polling booth is secret, but the databases know who has voted in party primaries, or is registered as Republican, Democrat or unaffiliated.

"You typically don't want to go after Republicans who have voted in every single primary for the past 20 years," Lee said. "Not persuadable."

The lists are sortable by neighborhood. A canvasser can follow a list up one side of the street and down the other side, stopping only at the homes of targeted voters.

The lists aren't infallible. "Persuadables" make up their minds. People move away. "The worst," Liston said, "is when you go to Mr. Jones' house and you find out Mr. Jones has just died."

At Liston's first stop of the afternoon, on Primrose Drive, Dee Moore said she was surprised to be told that according to Liston's list she was an unaffiliated voter. "I thought I was a Republican," she said.

Moore said she would vote for Liston, but he didn't ask her if he could stick a yard sign in her lawn.

Liston loves yard signs. They signal victory, like planting the flag on Iwo Jima. And they influence the neighbors.

"People see half a dozen Liston signs on a street and they go, ‘Geez, this guy's got a lot of support," he said. "What I consider a good day is when I get out about 8 or 10 or 15 yard signs."

He keeps lists of the people who have allowed him to put his signs in their yards, and checks up on his signs to see that they haven't been removed or vandalized.

Apparently, petty vandalism is about as rough as it gets on the campaign trail around here. "Most people tend to appreciate seeing an elected official come to their door," Liston said.

"If you get any indication from an individual that they don't want to be talking," Lee said, "you just politely back away and say, ‘Thanks, have a nice day, sorry to bother you.'"

Liston said he's had doors slammed in his face, but added, "About 90 percent of the people are reasonably friendly."

Lee's first stop was the Henry Boswell residence on Crown Ridge Drive. "He's an 85-year-old Republican, so this will be a challenge," Lee said. But no one answered the doorbell. Lee wrote "Sorry I missed you" on a campaign flier and tucked it into the screen door.

The next stop was also a not-at-home. But just down the street, at a house with an Obama-Biden sign planted in the yard, Alison Seyler answered the door.

"I have heard of you, and you have my vote, sir," Seyler told Lee. "I'm a lifelong Democrat."

"Well, thank you. You're easy," Lee said. "Have you voted already?"

"No, I have the ballot inside."

"OK. Wanted to remind you, it takes a 50 - what did I say? - 59-cent stamp."

"Any questions you want to ask me about my campaign?" Lee asked. "I guess if you're going to vote for me I've already sold the deal."

Seyler and Lee talked for several minutes about her autistic son and Amendment 51, a ballot proposal to increase the state sales tax by two-tenths of a percent to aid the developmentally disabled.

As he walked away from the Seyler house, Lee said he had violated a rule of canvassing: When someone has pledged her vote, say thanks and move on. Don't spend too much time with individual voters.

"You get drawn into lengthy conversations," Liston said. "Not that you don't want to speak to them, but you don't have time to speak to people for 30 minutes at a crack."

It helps to be observant. "You check out their bumper stickers," Lee said. "‘Death before dishonor' - that tells you something."

At one stop on Liston's list of unaffiliateds, an Obama sign was displayed in a window. Liston didn't even ring the doorbell, but left a campaign flier.

Liston also plays the bumper sticker interpretation game. "If they've got ‘I'm with the NRA,' probably going to lean my direction," he said. "Or if you see a sign, whatever, that says, you know, ‘Love, peace and coexist,' you know ..."

One difference between the two candidates' habits was that Liston actively campaigned for Sen. John McCain, Gov. Sarah Palin and Bob Schaffer, the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate, while Lee kept the focus on his own candidacy. With a relatively safe seat, Liston can afford the outreach, even if it alienates a few voters.

"I figure the Republicans are probably going to stick with me," he said. "I'm not too concerned. But we're seeing the unaffiliated voters, not so much for me but for the top of the ticket." The unaffiliateds, he said, "are the people that are going to turn the election one way or the other."

Lee, a Democrat in a Republican district, has no such luxury.

"I'll try to pivot the conversation to more local issues," he said. "I have a lot of McCain supporters who are supporting me. But if I start engaging in a discussion about Barack Obama, I'm on dangerous ground from the beginning."