By NLIHC Our Homes, Our Votes Team
With Election Day just around the corner, it’s time to rally, mobilize, and ensure residents’ voices are heard! NLIHC’s Our Homes, Our Votes (OHOV) Campaign is celebrating a year of partnership, learning, and action to strengthen nonpartisan voter engagement in communities across the country. Through our national webinar series, we’ve brought housing advocates and civic engagement partners together to share timely information, expert insights, and practical tools. Through our mini-grant program, organizations have brought civic engagement directly into their communities, helping renters and residents participate in the electoral process. Now, as we enter the final stretch before Election Day, let’s build on that momentum! We’re celebrating the incredible work of our grantees and partners and sharing resources to help the OHOV network encourage participation, empower residents, and ensure every voice has the opportunity to be heard.
Webinar Series
Our Homes, Our Votes’ 2026 webinar series brought together experts in the housing and civic space for discussions focused on advancing voter engagement among low-income renters. After the recent Louisiana v. Callais decision weakened civil rights protections under the “Voting Rights Act,” OHOV’s webinars were an opportunity to mobilize housing advocates to support the voting power of underrepresented communities. Throughout the webinars, advocates learned how to wield their power as a trusted messenger to support civic engagement by registering voters, combatting misinformation, and protecting voting rights. The webinars also spotlighted the obstacles low-income renters and unhoused residents face in casting their ballot, and the intervention tactics housing nonprofits can use to lower barriers. Panelists also shared key resources for advocates to use, including OHOV’s TurboVote tool and Resource Hub, National Voter Registration Day’s Partner Resources, and the Legal Defense Fund’s State Voting Rights Act information.
Mini-Grant Program
To support nonpartisan voter registration, Our Homes, Our Votes awarded 50 organizations $1,500 mini grants to help local nonprofits engage their communities. Alongside technical assistance from OHOV, organizations created their own initiatives to address the needs of their residents. Nonprofits across the country built local power and educated residents through tenant rights workshops, candidate questionnaires, and voter registration drives. Through the work of the mini-grant recipients, residents were educated and prepared to exercise their right to vote.
2026 Midterm Election Resources
With Election Day just around the corner, Our Homes, Our Votes has gathered resources to help housing advocates support nonpartisan voter participation and ensure residents have the information they need to make their voices heard.
Turning Renters into Voters: Lessons in Engaging Low-Income Communities: A best-practice report by Our Homes, Our Votes with practical strategies housing and homelessness organizations can use to increase voter turnout: https://nlihc.org/publications/our-homes-our-votes-turning-renters-voters.
TurboVote: An online, nonpartisan voter registration and information platform where you can register to vote, update your registration, sign up for election reminders, and find key deadlines, state-specific rules, and other election information for your community. TurboVote is available in both English and Spanish and can be used to engage community members: https://ourhomes.turbovote.org/.
866-OUR-VOTE: A national, nonpartisan initiative under the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law that works year-round to ensure that voters have an equal opportunity to vote and have their votes counted. It offers multilingual voter hotlines and opportunities to get help from trained volunteers: https://866ourvote.org/.
VOTE411.org: An online voter education resource from the League of Women Voters that provides election-related information, including a voter registration tool, polling place lookup, and state-specific ballot guides: http://vote411.org.
Rideshare2Vote AWARE: A nonpartisan organization that provides barrier-free rides to the polls in 13 states and counting. They also offer volunteering opportunities to support other voters in your community: https://rideshare2voteaware.org/.
VoteRiders: An educational platform to teach voters about voter ID laws and help citizens secure the IDs they need. VoteRiders operates a helpline to answer voters’ questions and provides practical, legal, and financial assistance for voters who need to obtain their documents: https://www.voteriders.org/.
Spread the Vote: Spread the Vote obtains voter identification for eligible voters in states with strict voter ID laws, creates election guides and educational tools, assists incarcerated voters with mail-in voting, and helps voters make and carry out voting plans: https://www.spreadthevote.org/.
Every One Votes: A campaign of the National Alliance to End Homelessness that supports people who are experiencing homelessness to exercise their right to vote. Providers can access resources and tools to support clients registering to vote: https://tr.ee/dMldsy.
You Don’t Need a Home to Vote: A campaign of the National Coalition for the Homeless that promotes voting access by engaging people experiencing homelessness in the democratic process: https://nationalhomeless.org/voting/.
REV UP: A nonpartisan campaign launched by the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD) that coordinates with national, state, and local organizations to increase the political power of the disability community: https://tr.ee/Yfcxay.
Patient Voting, a program of VOT-ER: Collects and publicizes state-specific information about the process of voting for people who are unexpectedly hospitalized in the days or weeks prior to an election: https://www.patientvoting.com/.
Affordable housing solutions are shaped by empowering community members through voter education and registration. Housing advocates are uniquely equipped to uplift underrepresented communities, and we encourage leaders to utilize OHOV’s resources to build local power.
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