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Summit elections board to order enough ballots for large percentage of voters heading to polls
By Stephanie Warsmith
Beacon Journal staff writer
Published on Wednesday, Sep 10, 2008
Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner has suggested that elections boards across Ohio order enough ballots for an 80 percent turnout in this year's presidential election.
But the Summit County elections board voted Tuesday to go beyond Brunner's suggestion — buying enough to cover 95 percent of the county's registered voters.
Board members disagreed on the figure, especially because of budget constraints by the county. But, board members decided to play it safe because they said they didn't want to chance running out of ballots on Election Day.
''The secretary of state tells us to expect the largest turnout in the state,'' said Jack Morrison Jr., the board's chairman. ''The last thing we want is to not have enough ballots.''
While 95 percent is high, the board has ordered more in the past, going with 101 percent of the registered voters as recently as the 2006 primary.
There are now about 360,000 registered voters in Summit County. This number is expected to climb to about 365,000 by next week, when the board will order ballots.
With the 95 percent coverage, the board will spend about $329,000 on ballots for Election Day and absentee voters. This is approximately $59,000 more than the board requested for the expense in a supplemental budget request approved Monday by County Council's finance committee. County Council still must approve the request.
Bryan Williams, the board's deputy director, said the board will be able to absorb the additional expense within its new, larger budget.
Wayne Jones, a Democratic board member, said he thought ordering ballots for 95 percent of registered voters was too much, considering that 100,000 Summit County voters are expected to vote absentee this year, which will decrease the numbers at the polls Nov. 4. This will be the first presidential election in which absentee votes can be cast without a special reason.
''I think we are doing way too many,'' Jones said.
Jones and Tim Gorbach, the other Democratic board member, voted with the GOP board members on the ballot order ''under protest.''
The board also voted to spend $25,000 on additional poll workers and ''greeters'' for busy polling sites in the November election and about $20,000 on additional locked bags that will be used to carry ballots to each polling location. Both items are covered under the board's budget.
In other business, the board voted to kick a liquor option off the November ballot to dry up carryouts in Akron's Ward 3-M. Had it passed, it would have meant that Roush's Market, 554 W. Thornton St., would no longer have been able to sell alcohol.
Board members disqualified the issue because a notice sent to Roush's Market had a post office box — instead of the required street address — for the petitioner.
In addition to that problem, Neal Atway, an attorney for Roush's Market, argued that there were other deficiencies, including those whose signatures were on the petition who said they didn't sign it.
Effie Stewart, a precinct committee member for the area, told the board she was frustrated that the issue was disqualified because of such a small flaw.
''There is a lot of alcoholism in our community,'' she said. ''If they want to dry up the area, they have the right to vote on it.''
Board members also heard a plea from Elaine Tompkins, treasurer of Norton Citizens for Dollars and Sense, to reconsider a November ballot issue to reduce a fire levy by half. The board previously found that the group didn't gather the required number of signatures.
Board members asked Williams and Marijean Donofrio, the board's director, to re-examine signatures flagged by Tompkins.
Stephanie Warsmith can be reached at 330-996-3705 or swarsmith@thebeaconjournal.com.
Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner has suggested that elections boards across Ohio order enough ballots for an 80 percent turnout in this year's presidential election.
Get the full article here.
Comments
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Orrville, Oh
Posted 10:00 PM, 09/10/2008
There are few candidates that believe there are a lot of things more valuable than stockholders marketing more stock dividends (money) quarterly in the wholesale and retail price of every product and service Human Beings use for life.
