CAN BLUE CITY SWING STATES?

Stacy LeVine approached an exposed Broadway storefront with loyal Democrats hawking Barack Obama and Joseph Biden presidential campaign buttons. LeVine, however, was more interested in volunteer opportunities than buttons. She wanted to work on behalf of the Obama campaign with the Three Parks Democratic club, a 30-year-old Upper West Side organization. LeVine, a 29-year-old Upper West Sider by way of Florida, said that giving her time to the campaign is the best way to ensure an Obama presidency-though she wishes she could vote by absentee ballot in her native state. "I need to do something beyond my vote," LeVine said. "New York is a lock for Obama. It's the other states that need help." The city's Obama boosters are looking to do more than just pull the lever in a voting booth or make a small donation, so local Democratic clubs are rounding up eager supporters to travel to swing states. The Gramercy Stuyvesant Independent Democrats are targeting their resources and manpower in Florida, where the club hooked up with a campaign office in Sunrise, a town in Broward County. Former Assembly member Sylvia Friedman, the club's president, said the Obama campaign was willing to accommodate the volunteers in the swing state of their choice. "They want volunteers everywhere," Friedman said. "No one's ever said 'no' to us." On Broadway and West 103rd Street, Three Parks Democratic Club set up a makeshift campaign office, festooned with posters of Obama, his primary rival Sen. Hillary Clinton and some local flavor, like Assembly Member Daniel O'Donnell. The Broadway location is recruiting volunteers willing to pony up $25 for the bus ticket and to stump for Obama in Pennsylvania, a swing state in this year's presidential election. There is also a trip planned to Willingboro, N.J., to campaign for the Democrat running in a competitive House race. The club has operated this recruitment vehicle intermittingly since Walter Mondale's ill-fated 1984 campaign. Throughout September, the Upper West Side club recruited more than 500 people to travel to Bristol, Penn., a small township northeast of Philadelphia, to knock on doors, register voters and have them fill out questionnaires to gauge which issues matter in this election. The club already sent one group of volunteers to Bristol and is planning on making at least two more trips. The response among volunteers has been so overwhelming that people had to travel by carpool, trains and vans. "The people in this neighborhood are doing whatever they can to reach out to important voters, wherever they are," said Bob Botfeld, the club's president and district leader. "They want to feel like they're doing something." The reception has been mostly positive, save for the differing opinions in social issues and the stereotype that Obama is an elitist, Botfeld said. "If we show knowledge of their local issues, they listen," he said. As for his New York residence, locals often don't ask, he added, "unless you have an accent."