We tell young people their voice matters—then don’t tell them about real ways to use it.
They’re not apathetic. They’re responding, logically, to a system that has kept them on the sidelines.
In the 2024 election, or what some might say the “most important election of our lifetime,” only about 64% of Washingtonians aged 18 to 24 voted—a 8.5% decrease from 2020.
That’s not because they don’t care—it’s because they don’t believe their vote impacts their life. They’re asked to vote, volunteer, and post selfies with “I Voted” stickers… all while getting left behind by the very institutions that claim to represent them.
That’s not apathy. That’s rational disengagement.
If we’re serious about changing this, we have to offer more than hashtags and hope. We need to show young people exactly where power lives—and hand them the keys.
That’s where the PCO Project comes in.
PCO stands for Precinct Committee Officer—a position so low on the political ladder that almost nobody has heard of it. A Precinct Committee Officer (PCO) is one of the most important—and overlooked—roles in our democracy. PCOs are the backbone and fundamental building block of our democracy. They organize their neighborhoods, turn out voters, help shape local endorsements, and recommend appointments to vacant seats in the State Legislature.
In Washington state, anyone who is 18 or older can become a PCO (Note: 17-year-olds who are 18 by the August primary, can also file to run, and anyone can be appointed to become an appointed or acting PCO). It’s the rare case where we don’t have to pass new legislation or build new infrastructure. The opportunity already exists. We just need to let young people know it’s there.
In partnership with Teach with TVW, we launched the PCO Project, to do exactly that.
We created a one-hour civic lesson plan. No vague ideals—just practical information: What is a PCO? What do they do? How do you become one? And why does it matter?
The curriculum includes videos, worksheets, and a clear call to action: run.
We piloted it in high schools across the state during the 2023–24 school year, gathered feedback, revised it, sought feedback from Democratic and Republican leaders, and presented it at statewide social studies conferences. These materials are included in the Washington Open Educational Resources (OER) Hub, and the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) shares updates with educators through the Social Studies Newsletter.
This is not a partisan project. It’s a structural one.
Here’s what we know: when students learn they can actually run for a political position while still in high school or college, something clicks. Politics stops being something that happens to them and becomes something they can shape.
This is the kind of low-cost, high-impact civic infrastructure we keep saying we want—and it’s already built.
But here’s the punchline: more than half of precincts in Washington still don’t have a PCO. It is a structural hole in the foundation of our democracy. And young people are uniquely positioned to fill.
We talk a lot about how to meet people where they are. What if we just put them where they should be—on the ballot?
The long-term vision for the PCO Project is simple: fill every precinct in WA with a PCO.
Political parties across the country are struggling with institutional decay. Volunteers are aging out. Infrastructure is thin. Local politics is increasingly dominated by the loudest voices, not the most representative ones. The solution isn’t just more engagement from the top down. It’s new leadership from the bottom up.
Imagine a Washington where every high school senior and college student who’s civically curious, learns that they can run for something. Where precincts across the state are represented by 18-24 year-olds organizing block-by-block voter turnout. Where civic education leads not just to test scores—but to ballots, campaigns, and policy change.
This isn’t about saving democracy for the next generation. It’s about giving this generation a reason to believe it’s worth saving.
We’re not there yet. But we’ve started.
This piece was written in collaboration with the PCO Project and Teach with TVW.
If you would like to support the project or become a PCO yourself, please reach out to Chirag at chiragdart@gmail.com.
Teach with TVW is the Education Department of TVW. It is a non-partisan, non-profit organization that focuses on teaching state government to the students of Washington State, including how the legislative, executive, and judicial branches work. By focusing on issues that are travelling through the state, students learn how to think about and navigate the government, not what to think about it.
Chirag Vedullapalli is U.S. Congressman Adam Smith’s (WA-09). He created the PCO Project in partnership with Teach with TVW to strengthen democracy, get out the vote, and fill every empty precinct in Washington State with a young person. He also currently serves on the board of the Queen Anne Helpline — a non-profit focused on homelessness prevention — and volunteers on HomeSight’s Board Real Estate Development Committee to support the creation of affordable homeownership opportunities.