League of Women Voters Woodbury-Cottage Grove Area

The League of Women Voters of Woodbury Cottage Grove Area (LWVWCGA) is a program within the League of Women Voters of Minnesota (LWVMN), which is a non-profit organization. 

From the beginning, the LWV has been an activist, grassroots organizations whose leaders believed that citizens should play a critical role in advocacy. It was then, and is now, a nonpartisan organization. LWV encouraged members to be politically aware and engaged individuals. 

This holds true today. LWV is nonpartisan, neither supporting nor opposing candidates or political parties at any level of government, but always working on vital issues of concern to members and the public. The LWV has a long, rich history, that continues with each passing year. 

Woodbury Cottage Grove Area League

Following Woodbury’s incorporation in 1967, a group of women took the first steps to form a local chapter of the League of Women Voters. Forty-one women comprised the Provisional League in January 1969. In November 1970, the Woodbury League of Women Voters became part of the fifty-year-old national nonpartisan organization. In 1980, the Woodbury and Cottage Grove Leagues merged.

The purpose of the League is to promote political responsibility through active participation by informed citizens. Past actions of LWVWCGA includes work on issues facing the cities we serve (Cottage Grove, Gray Cloud Island Township, Newport, St. Paul Park and Woodbury), school districts (622, 833 and 834),  environment and climate change, housing, and aging.

Informing the community is a significant calling of the League.  The League sponsors community forums to address timely issues that feature subject-matter experts. One of the most popular of these forums is the January virtual meeting featuring incumbent state senators and representatives.

The League is best-known for bipartisan candidates’ forums, which gives citizens the opportunity to learn about candidates for school district, city, county, and state offices. The Woodbury, Cottage Grove Area League of Women Voters has organized and sponsored over one hundred candidate forums throughout its history. Originally held in school cafeterias, candidate forums are now hosted in facilities with cablecast technology, thereby giving greater access to the communities we serve.

LWV is an organization fully committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion in principle and in practice. Diversity, equity, and inclusion are central to the organization’s current and future success in engaging all individuals, households, communities, and policy makers in creating a more perfect democracy.