If you haven’t registered yet to vote in Washington and need a little prompting, just realize there is an entire month devoted to this one easy but important action.

September is National Voter Registration Month. Secretary of State Sam Reed is joining fellow members of the National Association of Secretaries of State (NASS) to work toward the goal of making eligible voters aware of registration deadlines and requirements for the General Election ending Nov. 6.  Reed and other NASS members are also using this as an opportunity to promote state resources to help with the registration process.

“This month is all about reminding citizens to get registered,” said Reed.  “Voting is one of our most important rights and we want to start reaching out to voters now so they will be prepared before the upcoming election.”

Reed and other Secretaries of State throughout the U.S. want to encourage voter participation and increase awareness of state requirements and deadlines as much as possible. Despite record-breaking registration and voter turnout levels in many states for the November 2008 presidential election, 6 million potential voters didn’t cast a ballot because they missed a voter registration deadline or didn’t know how to register to vote.

There is still time to get registered to vote if you haven’t already. Eligible citizens who are 18 years of age or older may register to vote, and every state except North Dakota has a registration requirement for voting. Washington is one of 10 states currently offering online voter registration and is the first state to offer voter registration via Facebook.

The deadline for online registration, address changes and other registration updates for the 2012 General Election is October 8.  General Election ballots will be mailed out to registered voters on October 19, and the deadline to register in person for new Washington voters is October 29.

If you have recently moved or changed your name, you will need to update your voter registration information.  If you want more information on updating your registration or on registration dates and deadlines, you can contact the Secretary of State’s office or click here and visit our Elections Division’s webpage. The Elections page allows you to access MyVote, your personal voter registration tool. The webpage also has a list of registration deadlines as well as answers to frequently asked questions under the subheadings “I am a” and “I need to” at the bottom of the page.