Indiana

Vote Centers Instead of Satellites

By Abdul Hakim-Shabazz

I sat through the Marion County Election Board hearing Tuesday as members of the public (albeit Democratic constituents) but the public nonetheless, express their support for satellite voting and encouraged the board to approve it.  It takes a unanimous decision by the Board to approve satellite voting.

Marion County Clerk Beth White wants it, GOP Chairman Tom John says there aren’t enough safeguards to ensure the integrity of the vote. I’ve included my interviews with both in the blog post, however I think the real way to address this issue is the creation of vote centers.

The difference between vote centers and satellite voting is that with vote centers, you can vote anywhere in your County on Election Day.  With satellite voting, you can only vote early.   When my wife tried to vote on primary day, her polling place;s inspector didn’t show so she couldn’t vote.  She’s a massage therapist and had an appointment on the other side of town.   When she got done, I convinced her to drive back across town to vote.  Had their been a vote center open, she would not have had to make the trip to exercise her civic duty.

In addition, the data has showed that voter turnout did not increase that much due to satellite voting and the numbers in the 2010 primary showed a 15% turnout, just slightly more than the 2006 mid-terms.

I understand Democrats and Republicans need to go through the motions on this one, but once that’s over they should join together and go to the legislature and make vote centers the law.  That would go a long way to increasing voter participation and allowing citizens more options when it comes to voting.

Beth White (Satellite voting)

Tom John (Satellite voting)

Full post as published by Indiana Barrister on August 18, 2010 (boomark / email).