Some polling places could be relocated
Published 1:20 am Friday, April 29, 2011
Some Beaufort County voters may find themselves marking ballots at different polling places this fall or next spring.
The Beaufort County Board of Elections will conduct a public-input session at 6 p.m. Tuesday to receive input as it seeks to relocate several polling places in the county. There are 21 precincts in the county. The board begins its meeting at 5 p.m. at its office at 1308 Highland Drive (at the rear of the former Tideland Mental Health building).
“The board realized through the last elections that some of the polling places needed to be upgraded. We’re looking at it from the prospective of the voter, the poll workers and the candidates,” said Kellie Harris Hopkins, elections director for Beaufort County. “We had some issues with campaigning and how to police it — the 50-foot barrier. … We’ve looked at all 21 precincts and looked at possibly changing the polling places. We’d like to have the public’s input on it since they’re the ones that use them.”
“If anyone has any thoughts at all, the board wants to hear from them,” said Thomas S. Payne, elections board chairman. “I am only one of three people on the board, but I’m sure the other two board members want to hear from anyone with any thoughts on this.”
“The whole purpose of looking at the polling places is making the voting process better,” he said.
Input from voters and poll workers will play a key role in helping the board reach a decision, Payne said.
“It really depends on what happens Tuesday night,” Payne said when asked how the board will approach making polling-place changes.
The relocation of polling places must be approved by the State Board of Elections and “precleared” by the U.S. Justice Department, Hopkins said. She was referring to the department’s regulation of any election changes in North Carolina counties covered under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Section 5 requires “preclearance” of election changes in counties affected by said section of the act, which was designed to guarantee equal voting rights for minorities. In North Carolina, 40 counties are subject to the preclearance mandate, including Beaufort County.
Hopkins said elections officials rode through the county last week and identified five polling places that need immediate attention.
“We sent out a survey asking all the poll workers if they had any issues with the polling places,” she said of the board members. “So now that they’ve looked at all 21, they would like the public’s input.”
Possible changes
Among the precincts that could see their polling places change are Aurora, Blount’s Creek, Belhaven, Pinetown and Washington-Ward 1, Hopkins said.
Hopkins said the board likes using fire-department buildings as polling places “because they are easy to get along with.” Fire-department buildings offer plenty of room for voting booths and poll workers and plenty of parking for voters, she said. However, safety concerns make using such buildings problematic at times, she said.
“On Election Day, we had an issue in Blount’s Creek where a voter was blocking the bay (where a fire engine was parked) during a fire call,” Hopkins said.
As for the current Belhaven polling place, it has two entrances, which can make it difficult on poll workers to monitor the comings and goings there, she said. A polling place with one entrance would be better for voting purposes, she said.
The board is looking at moving the Pinetown polling place from the Ruritan building to the fire department because its a new facility and offers better parking, Hopkins said.
The East Haven apartment building serves at the polling place for the Washington-Ward 1 precinct, but the local Meals on Wheels program is using space in the building, decreasing the amount of space available for the polling place, Hopkins said. That’s why the board is looking for a new polling place for that precinct, she noted.
A new polling place for the Hunters Bridge precinct is needed because the Free Union Community Building, the polling place for that precinct, was damaged by fire earlier this year.
Voters in the Gilead precinct have been voting at the Chocowinity precinct since the loss of Ephesus Free Will Baptist Church as the polling place in Gilead precinct and the loss of a proposed replacement polling place forced the board to shift voters from Gilead precinct to the Chocowinity polling place in 2008.
Criteria
One challenge the board faces in relocation polling places is finding sites that are accessible to handicapped voters, Hopkins said. Polling places must comply with the Americans With Disabilities Act, she noted.
Prospective sites should be as centrally located in a precinct as possible, easily accessible, have plenty of parking area and, if possible, have a kitchen area, or at least a microwave oven, she said. Because poll workers are not allowed to leave polling places while the polls are open, having a kitchen or a microwave oven available to them allows them to prepare meals while they work, Hopkins noted.
Polling places also must provide enough room for candidates or their representatives to campaign but remain at least 50 feet away from the polling place, she said. Candidates or their representatives are not allowed to campaign within 50 feet of a polling place.
Owners of facilities used as polling places are compensated for that use, with the compensation ranging from $25 to $150, Hopkins said. Some property owners want a nominal fee because they believe providing a polling place is their civic duty, she noted.
The board likely will take a couple of months to consider the public’s input and evaluate prospective polling places before proposing any changes, Hopkins said.
“They want to make as many people happy as we can possibly make happy,” Hopkins said of the expected changes in polling places.
About Mike Voss
Mike Voss is the contributing editor at the Washington Daily News. He has a daughter and four grandchildren. Except for nearly six years he worked at the Free Lance-Star in Fredericksburg, Va., in the early to mid-1990s, he has been at the Daily News since April 1986.
Journalism awards:
• Pulitzer Prize for Meritorious Public Service, 1990.
• Society of Professional Journalists: Sigma Delta Chi Award, Bronze Medallion.
• Associated Press Managing Editors’ Public Service Award.
• Investigative Reporters & Editors’ Award.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Public Service Award, 1989.
• North Carolina Press Association, Second Place, Investigative Reporting, 1990.
All those were for the articles he and Betty Gray wrote about the city’s contaminated water system in 1989-1990.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Investigative Reporting, 1991.
• North Carolina Press Association, Third Place, General News Reporting, 2005.
• North Carolina Press Association, Second Place, Lighter Columns, 2006.
Recently learned he will receive another award.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Lighter Columns, 2010.
4. Lectured at or served on seminar panels at journalism schools at UNC-Chapel Hill, University of Maryland, Columbia University, Mary Washington University and Francis Marion University.
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