The Sedgwick County Voters’ Coalition, concerned that 65 percent of the county’s polling places are churches, has recommended to Election Commissioner Bill Gale that all sites be public facilities. As our editorial argues today, that view seems extreme, "because it assumes there is something about a place of worship that is incompatible with the practice of democracy." But churches increasingly are politically active, and "if a church’s pastor has been out front on a defining election issue, is it appropriate to require citizens, including many who disagree with him, to enter that church in order to cast their votes?" We conclude: "When it comes to making more voters want to vote, the more public and neutral the site, the better."
Another point to ponder: When Stanford University Graduate School of Business researchers recently analyzed polling locations and the outcome of several Arizona ballot initiatives, they found "that environmental cues present in different polling locations can influence voting outcomes." Those who vote at schools are more likely to support higher school spending, those who vote in churches are less likely to vote for stem cell initiatives, etc. "What our research suggests is that it might be useful to further investigate influences such as polling location to better understand how such factors affect different types of voting situations. From a policy perspective, the hope is that a voting location assignment could be less arbitrary and more determined in order to avoid undue biases in the future," said researcher S. Christian Wheeler.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
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43 Comments
I’ve always wondered about something. If they can mail out our voters registration cards – then why can’t they just mail us a ballot for election day? That way, every person can vote and it doesn’t really matter at what “location” the person is voting. For accountability, every person registered only gets one vote. Or would that be too simple and not set up fraud to happen on election day – like with those Diebold machines?
The Democratic candidate for Kansas Secretary of State, Haley, favors making voting from home a possibility.
I sent Rhonda an email asking for a link to the Stanford University study she describes. Hope she posts it here somewhere. The results of that study would seem to be profoundly important!
I apologize to Rhonda, if you click on her second link in the above thread header (the underlined editorial), the Stanford University study appears.
For fear of sounding like Emily Lutella, “Never mind…”
Now, I am really confused, when I click on the links, I no longer get the Stanford study. Could this be a conspiracy by either the churchs or public schools?
Any way… here is a link to the study Rhonda mentions:
http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/research/pubpolicy_wheeler_pollinglocation.shtml
For those of you who are more dweebish, like I tend to be, here is a pdf of the whole study Rhonda mentions:
https://gsbapps.stanford.edu/researchpapers/library/RP1926.pdf
Somebody on the “grassy knoll”, is messing with me today! I do not appreciate it!
I am going to type out the link that is not hot above. You may have to enter it into your web browser to get to the .pdf I mention.
https://gsbapps.stanford.edu/researchpapers/library/RP1926.pdf
If you still can’t get to this paper, and want it desperately, email and I will see what I can do.
Anyone can go to the Sedgwick County website and get an advance voting ballot sent to their home.
sedgwickcounty.org/elections/index.html
I checked it, if you type in the above address into your web browser, you will get to the .pdf.
Put down a loss for the “grassy knoll” today. Ha!
Interesting.
This was my first thought when I heard that schools were phased out in favor of churches–that forcing people into places of worship would benefit the conservative-fundie radicals.
Anyway, you CAN vote by mail.
Contact the Sedgwick County Democrats to get an absentee ballot. They’ll send someone to your house and submit the completed form to the election office for you.
You don’t even need a stamp.
BTW, CR, Oregon does exactly what you’re talking about.
The Republicans are never going to let it happen here though.
It would not make sense to prohibit polling sites in churches, synagogues or temples in a city this large. However, it also makes no sense to prohibit using schools and publicly-owned facilities either. The problem is that the Election Commissioner seems impervious to reasonable suggestions to equalize secular and religious facilities being used for voting. Bill Gale’s power to unilaterally impose his will on the electorate is vitually unfettered. Unless Bill Buchanan and the Sedg. Cty. Commission is willing to issue explicit demands upon him – after all, they hold the purse strings – I see little chance that Gale will relent.
With modern technology it would seem that we should be able to develop a system where a person can vote anywhere in the County. Use his ID to get the correct ballot on the computer screen and he votes that ballot. That way, rather than voting at the Church near where I live I might vote elsewhere such as near where I work.
My issue is not with churches, rather with geography. However, I pose a question for the uber-religious: How comfortable would you be voting at the Mosque?
Who is the Sedgwick County Voters’ Coalition?
It seems a very silly concern. If your vote is affected based on where your polling place is located, do us all a favor and please just stay home.
Ben, I suppose that if the subject of this story holds up, if we did vote in a mosque, we’d vote biased in favor of Muslim extremists?
Me, it wouldn’t effect me at all. My idea above is to facilitate voting at lunch hour etc when I work on the opposite side of the county from where I live.
Actually, I would like to see us go to two-day voting; Saturday and Sunday all day.
I will vote wherever they need me too.
My voting locations have either been a fire station or lakeside clubhouse. Never voted in a church.
Well, this whole thing is screwed up, isn’t it? All the government has to do is send out a ballot, with a carbon copy, to every registered voter via the U.S. Postal Service. Give people two weeks to return it, in a postage paid envelop.
Assign randomized numbers to every ballot.Then the newspaper, it’s website, and a government website would post numbered-voters’ votes. People would be able to access the information, looking at their carbon-copy, to ensure that their votes reported were their actual votes.
Then have Repub, Demo, Green, Independent, ACLU, et al auditors’ offices for people to complain to if they find discrepencies between their carbon copies and their publicly accessible reports stating who and what they voted for.
If major discrepencies are found that determine “official” election results to be bogus, then lawsuits are filed, and tentative election results that don’t actually reflect voters’ votes get overturned.
And, BTW, it’s totally technologically doable for paper ballots to be put on a Scantron and read accurately amd efficiently. That’s how your kids’ mass-testing scores are tabulated.
Little too simple, Heart. People move and forget to update their new addresses. OMG, chances of FRAUD if someone else gets hold of the previous resident’s ballot.
Did they take the voting places out of schools since convicted child molesters are not allowed in schools and that would prevent them from voting?
I will be voting by mail. Really, I don’t even trust that.
My original polling place was a school. Then it was moved to a church. Funny, I started getting mail from that church just about the same time. When I went to vote, I had to work my way through a maze of tables covered with religious literature.
My polling place has changed AGAIN to another church. The mail from the first church continues and now I get mail from my new polling place.
I join the call to bring voting into the 21st century. Heart had good ideas.
“It seems a very silly concern. If your vote is affected based on where your polling place is located, do us all a favor and please just stay home.”
I HAVE TO AGREE, I CAN NOT BELIEVE THAT WE HAVE THAT MANY WEAK MINDED PEOPLE THAT VOTE!
The county should have to pay rent to the churches to keep the separation of church and state.
“I HAVE TO AGREE, I CAN NOT BELIEVE THAT WE HAVE THAT MANY WEAK MINDED PEOPLE THAT VOTE!”
Sorry, R.A., what country do you live in?
Your dictator,GW Bush
“It seems a very silly concern. If your vote is affected based on where your polling place is located, do us all a favor and please just stay home.”
Okay… let’s have polling in slaughterhouses, sewage treatment plants, along airport runways, noisy factories, etc…
Polling at large apartments is convenient for residents, and surrounding neighbors. Early polling at a neighborhood grocery store is also handy.
In my home town I voted at a grocery store. Voting locations were in public buildings like schools or malls, nary a church to be used. How ironic to go into a church to vote when the entire purpose of a church is to subvert the authority of the people for the authority of a priestly class.
So, with this (logic?), if I vote in a grocery store, I’m more likely to consume commercial food products??If I vote in the fire station, will I be more likely to be an arsonist?If I vote at the courthouse would I be more likely a defendant?Hmmmm……
So, with this (logic?), if I vote in a grocery store, I’m more likely to consume commercial food products??If I vote in the fire station, will I be more likely to be an arsonist?If I vote at the courthouse would I be more likely a defendant?Hmmmm……
Looks like if I vote online,I get to vote twice! HA
Ok Tracy since you’re older than I am I’m hoping you remember the correct phrasing.
“Vote early and often”
Is this the right phrasing? Something about Chicago(?) and stuffing the ballot box.My brain isn’t functioning quite normally today – sorry.
That’s pretty close.The way I heard it was:Vote early and vote often.
I still like my slogan:SELL LEG, NOT ARMS!!
Just remember julie – in chicago they have to keep the polls open two hours after sunset. That allows enough time for the dead to rise and vote!
POT IN EVERY CHICKEN!!!
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedy……Ernest Benn
If Oregon can do voting better then why can’t Kansas? Also – if a person votes in a church and then starts receing mail from that church – then did that person really cast a secret ballot?
Would all of the people that believe that forcing people to go to a church to vote is not a problem feel the same way if their polling place was located in an adult bookstore or stripclub?
IMO, forcing someone to enter a place that makes them uncomfortable or that they find offensive in order to vote should not be a part of the political process. If we are forced to vote in a church, the church should be required to remove or cover all of the crosses, symbols, bibles and other literature on election day. You cannot be a polling place and a house of worship at the same time.
We could have the ability to vote any where in the city if the State would pass the requirement for photo ID’s. It was passed by the legislature but the Governor vetoed it.
With our schools being so over crowed and their parking lots so full it only makes sense not to be at the schools.
Heck, I live in Palm Springs, California, and, when I go to my polling place, it’s not there anymore. They switch them almost every election without notice.
It should be law that all voting locations be held in a publicly owned (city, state, or federal) building, and not located in private homes, nursing homes, churches, hospitals, monasteries, private schools, or private businesses.
These locations should also be accessible within a 100-yard radius of public transportation in order to assure that all citizens have equal access to voting locations.
I voted today in a location that was a very isolated location, with no public transportation Mt Saint Mary’s – Marian Hall, 3700 E Lincoln, Wichita, KS, which was quite a distance from the public streets. Seems only accessible via car and with limited parking space. This location is unacceptable to the general public and discourages voting from our poorest citizens as there is no easy way to get there.
Joyce, while I am in general agreement with you, there is one small factual misstatement you made. The East Lincoln bus goes right by the polling place you mentioned, on Lincoln; surely, not too convenient, as the passenger wanting to vote there has to walk into Mt St Mary’s from the street; and, the East Lincoln route runs hourly, for the most part. But, it is served by public transportation, albeit poorly; unlike several other polling places around Wichita (the Northwest and Southwest sides of town come to mind, in particular).
The system has worked for a very long time and has even been made easier. One can vote early in person or early via mail or somebody will come and pick you up and take you to the polls. There is absolutely no excuse for not voting if you want to vote. I am seeing a lot of excuse making on this blog.
hotlick, what you say is true; but there are those who think they must vote on Election Day, and for those, access to the polls needs to be made easier. Some folks are reluctant to contact the parties for rides to the polls, etc.; for some, it is pride. Not valid excuses, to be sure; but they exist.
There simply are not enough public buildings of this sort to accomodate all the voting places. I agree with hotlick that the system in place works reasonably well using churches, schools, etc etc etc.
We have a church in walking distance from my home; we do not have a government building that close.
Yes they do exist. It is my opinion that everybody should not vote. If you are not informed or if you are not aware of all the media blitz telling us all how and when we can vote, I hope they stay home. There are excuses for a lot of things, but not voting if you want to should be an excuse that should be ridiculed.
I voted in a church and it only burned my skin just a little. I even got to see Jim “Old Flik” Erickson helping out at the polls.Everything went smoothly. Being a Republican in Riverside is like being a Democrat in Kansas.
A little perspective….
Voters in Iraq WALKED to all polls because the use of cars was banned. Furthermore, they did so while their lives were at high risk. AND they had significantly higher turnout than we could dream of in the US.
Are we really that offended by voting in churches? You could have voted early in another location.
Do you know one factor politicians intensely fear? RAIN!!! In American we don’t vote because it RAINS!!!!
The states where voter turn out is the best is in the Northern (cold) states and lower in the warmer states. No excuses for not voting. The libs will supply plenty of the excuses when things don’t go there way.