2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumIt is not a good idea to locate a voting center in a police station or branch office
Excuse my frustration. My county is adopting countywide voting which means that on election day a voter can vote at any voting location in the county and not just at their local precinct. I have been an election judge a couple of times each cycle and it is painful to tell someone five minutes before polls close that they are at the wrong location. This plan eliminates that problem.
We had a meeting to discuss locations for polling center and two GOP mayors of small towns really wanted polling locations/voting centers in their local police stations. My county party chair and I went nuts on this suggestion and hurt their feelings. We also had an argument that if it was okay to have a polling location at a supermarket where white people shop, then it was also okay to have a voting center at an other supermarket where less well off people shopped.
It was a frustrating meeting
TreasonousBastard
(43,049 posts)along with the occasional senior center.
Dunno why supermarkets and police stations would be considered.
(Security? People gotta shop?)
Hassin Bin Sober
(26,344 posts)Rod Beauvex
(564 posts)Did they serve alcohol while voting was going on? Any brawls over candidates?
Also, excellent screen name.
Hassin Bin Sober
(26,344 posts)In the old days, I would have just voted on the way home. Tip the bartender and vote.
It was "the piano man bar" on chicago north side by wrigley.
Gothmog
(145,619 posts)Schools and churches are used often. We have convinced the elections office to look at a mosque in a heavy democratic area
PRB
(139 posts)Of course, I have seen all different places proposed. Once adjacent city where I lived discussed a public-private partnership with a grocery chain. The shopping idea was considered. I did not live in that town, but it wasn't a bad idea. People could be civic and then buy their groceries after work.
The police station does have it's pluses with politics getting more contentious. Even a sign can set people off. Probably wouldn't have too much trouble in a police station.
Downwinder
(12,869 posts)1. The church basement/hall/sunday school area is empty and unused on a Tuesday.
2. The church usually has ample parking which is normally empty on a Tuesday.
3. The church has easy access and exit with large doors able to handle crowds.
My precinct is in the church hall of a Roman Catholic church and I was raised as a Protestant to regard the Roman Catholic church has an evil entity brainwashing their followers. Somehow, I manage to cast my vote within sight of an uncovered crucifix without suffering severe damage to my psyche, without influencing my vote, and without forced conversion to Catholicism.
When i was a kid, we had a voting precinct in our elementary school which meant that on election day we couldn't use the gym (which was also the cafeteria with tables coming out of the wall like a Murphy bed). Gym classes were cancelled and we had to schlepp our lunch trays down to our classroom and eat at our desk.
If i was an election official, i would make maximum use of any available and conveniently located churches, synagogues, and mosques.
Travis_0004
(5,417 posts)Its nearby, plenty of parking, and plenty of room
Sunlei
(22,651 posts)The cost savings alone in admin. could be used for free transportation for voters, a shuttle van or school bus loops the town.
seveneyes
(4,631 posts)Rather than just a local paper register of precinct voters.
Gothmog
(145,619 posts)When we check a voter in, then that voter can not vote any where else in the county
Harris County is run by teabagger idiot and they use paper poll books on election day
LiberalFighter
(51,104 posts)1) If there is not sufficient parking for peak times. That limits the number of locations that can handle voters.
2) Access in and out of the building. Difference when it is precinct voting location compared to a voting center.
3) Distance factor when voting centers are limited. There are many voters that have difficulty
4) Increase in waiting time during peak periods.
5) Reliable internet connection to confirm eligibility, correct ballot, and voting status.
6) Having sufficient election workers to handle peak periods. That also allows some relief.
7) Having sufficient election workers at each of the voting centers. When voters can vote at any voting center in the county the ability to assign sufficient workers at each location is more difficult. A voter could decide to vote at a voting center that is either closest to their home, work place, shopping, medical appointment, school their child attends, child care, etc.
8) Population of county.
Cost savings imo would not be enough to provide free transportation.
appalachiablue
(41,177 posts)aren't used that I'm aware of. Parking in urban areas might be a problem, but eliminated if voting was expanded beyond one day, which it should. How hard is it, like mail in ballots in Oregon and other places that are very successful and popular.
Hekate
(90,829 posts)There's limited space inside as well.
We use church halls and community centers. It's always easy to get in and out, there's plenty of open space inside the halls to put up voting booths, plenty of space for the tables used by the volunteers. Plus, they are sprinkled around every neighborhood and available on Tuesdays.
Chan790
(20,176 posts)I ask because our sole voting precinct for the town I live in is "in the local police station" because the police station is also town hall. If they barred use of police stations...we'd have no place to put a voting precinct.
There is literally no place else to put it...we have regional schools in an adjacent town so schools would be out.
Ruby the Liberal
(26,219 posts)Sure there is a good explanation, I am just not seeing what it is?
Here, we vote at our assigned locations. Mostly schools and churches. The logic is that the schools cover where the people live and the churches help with overflow (I'm in a city - suburban areas are schools and community centers mostly). Adding in a police station wouldn't be of much help as there is typically only one per township and not convenient like the other more spread out options. That wouldn't pick up much of the overflow from long lines, but I don't get why it would be a concern overall?
Hekate
(90,829 posts)One of several voter suppression tactics utilized in Florida and some other states is to have police roadblocks in the vicinity of polling places in black neighborhoods. This provides the cops with plenty of excuse to stop black drivers and detain them on whatever bogus charge they can dream up on the spot (as has been the practice in Ferguson Missouri, if you will recall), and plenty of potential Democratic voters just turn around and drive away in the other direction.
Ruby the Liberal
(26,219 posts)But OP said that they are moving to an open county - people aren't going to be assigned polling stations. Doesn't it make sense to add more options (whatever they are) for a design like that to reduce the time folks have to wait in line?
Gothmog
(145,619 posts)We are pushing for commercial locations and places where people work while the GOP wants to limit these locations to the country clubs and golf courses
Ruby the Liberal
(26,219 posts)Welcome to red state purgatory.
I get it now. Good luck!
Gothmog
(145,619 posts)For example, former CJ Rehnquist got his start in GOP politics as a member of a GOP goon squad that swept in to prevent non-whites from voting http://www.democracynow.org/2000/12/12/as_supreme_court_decides_presidency_chief
Between 1958 and 1962, when Rehnquist was a private attorney in Arizona, he served as the director of Republican "ballot security" operations in poor neighborhoods in Phoenix. Rehnquist was part of Operation Eagle Eye, a flying squad of GOP lawyers that swept through polling places in minority-dominated districts to challenge the right of African Americans and Latinos to vote. At the time, Democratic poll watchers had to physically push Rehnquist out of the polling place to stop him from interfering with voting rights.
Two decades later, during Rehnquists 1986 Senate confirmation hearing for appointment to head the Supreme Court, he denied targeting minority voters. Some election watchers, who had personally observed Rehnquists tactics in Phoenix, accused him of lying to Congress.
In 1982 the RNC got really aggressive with ballot security and had officers at polling locations with "poll watchers" to challenge voters who were not sufficiently white in a tactic called voter caging. The DNC sued and has maintained a cease and desist order against the RNC that expires in January of 2017 http://www.brennancenter.org/legal-work/dnc-v-rnc-consent-decree
Many low income voters are worried about police at a polling location given this history. Having a polling place at a police station would be a really bad idea in Texas
Gothmog
(145,619 posts)My county was not mentioned in this article but we have another meeting on Tuesday http://www.electionline.org/index.php/electionline-weekly
In Texas, a slow-building revolution is moving one county at a time to switch the largest state in the lower 48 to a vote center system instead of the traditional precinct-based polling places.
Since beginning a pilot program of vote centers nearly a decade ago just over 10 percent of the states 200+ counties used vote centers in the most recent statewide election and more are petitioning to make the move.
While not willing to call the pilot an outright success because of the still small sample of counties using the system, the secretary of states report to the 84th Legislature on the program said anecdotally, vote centers do make easier for voters and elections officials alike.
However, anecdotal evidence from the participating counties, including feedback from voters and election officials, along with the turnout percentages, suggest countywide election polling places offer a way to ensure that voters who plan to vote in the election have an increased opportunity to do so much as with early voting, the report said.
Bluenorthwest
(45,319 posts)so the choices should be community locations not police or postal offices or city halls. I live in Oregon, every home a polling place, every sofa a voting booth. No polling places at all. I really like that.
When I lived in CA, my polling places included private homes, The Workmen's Circle (a social justice oriented Jewish community center), a Catholic Church and the very gorgeous Yamashiro restaurant, home of post voting Saki sessions. All of these locations were very appropriate and a police station would not be, that's my opinion.
The only authority visible at a place of voting should be the voters.