Colorado’s status as a swing state in the presidential election has been drawing people from across the country to El Paso County, to volunteer for the Republican or Democratic campaigns.Out-of-staters walk neighborhoods, make phone calls, and do anything they’re asked that might help boost either Republican Mitt Romney or President Barack Obama.Tom and Laurie Fitch, a happily retired couple in their 70’s, drove up from their home in San Antonio, Texas, and are staying with an old family friend in Colorado Springs. They didn’t come to visit. They came to work.The pair arrived last Sunday, and walked neighborhoods for between five and six hours a day all week, knocking and doors and talking to voters until their feet hurt.“I’m here because I’m really concerned that the country’s ready to go off a cliff,” said Tom, a boisterous former pediatrician who typed up his own campaign flyers.The Fitches are not alone. Plenty of others — possibly hundreds — have also trekked to the Rockies Obama or Romney, both campaigns said.Libby Harvey, a retired 62-year-old, paid her own way from Washington state, and walked into a local Obama campaign office unannounced. She went straight up to the local field officer and asked if she could help.“He said, ‘Yes, come on,’” Libby said with a chuckle. “He must’ve thought I was nuts.”Like the Fitches, Harvey has a local connection — her son lives in Colorado Springs. But, also like the Fitches, her trip isn’t social. It’s a mission.“If I’d been asked to go to Grand Junction, I would have,” Harvey said.Her first trip to Colorado Springs was in July. She spent a month here in the summer, walking neighborhoods and making phone calls for up to six hours a day, and then left for a month and a half. But she came back on Sept. 20, and will likely stay through the election on Nov. 6.For Tom and Laurie Ftich, this is their first political rodeo. But Harvey is an old hand — she worked for Sen. John Kerry’s Democratic presidential campaign in 2004, and several others dating back to the 1970’s.All three said they came to Colorado because they wanted to make a difference in the race, and their respective states are essentially foregone conclusions — Texas is reliably Republican and Washington is solidly Democratic.Fitch dragged his wife to Colorado after he decided that canvassing and making phone calls in his neighborhood wasn’t going to do anything, since most of his neighbors were already voting for Romney.“This is the most important election in our lifetime. It could be the most important election in history,” Tom said intensely.He said Obama is leading the country in a “socialist” direction, and could wind up like Greece, which went so far into debt that its economy basically evaporated in 2009.Harvey is the polar opposite — she loves everything that Obama has done in office, and says he’s “fabulous.” She talks happily with people about Obamacare, education, and the economy.All three said working the election has been a thrill. Harvey said she absolutely loves her work.Harvey said about one phone call to an undecided voter, “At the end of one conversation, she said, ‘Okay, you’ve got my vote. That was very, very exciting.”The Fitches said the trip has been well worth their time.“I didn’t know what I was getting into, but it’s been great,” said Laurie Fitch.—Contact John Schroyer: 476-4825Twitter: @JohnschroyerFacebook: Gazette John Schroyer

Laurie and Tom Fitch stop at a woman’s house in Falcon to persuade her to vote for Romney. The Fitches traveled from San Antonio, Tx., and spent the week going door to door in Colorado Springs canvassing for Romney. Although the woman said she was voting for Obama, she was willing to take literature from the couple on Friday, October 12, 2012. (The Gazette/Jerilee Bennett) Photo by JERILEE BENNETT, THE GAZETTE

Jerilee Bennett