Board of Elections Proposes Adding Early Voting Locations
By Wesley Young, Winston-Salem Journal, N.C.
Mar. 19–With the North Carolina primary on May 6 shaping up as a potentially important battleground in the Democratic presidential nomination, the Forsyth County Board of Elections proposed yesterday adding five early-voting locations in Winston-Salem, bringing the total to nine.
Eric Elliott, the chairman of the local elections board, acknowledged that many of the new early-voting sites are expected to have a high turnout of Democratic voters. He said that is justified given the way the primary season has unfolded.
“For the primary, we have been called ‘Super Tuesday 3,’” Elliott said.
Elliott said that early-voting locations may be more widely distributed in the fall general election.
The three-member board split on party lines, with Elliott and fellow Democrat Linda Sutton approving the new sites, and Republican Jerry Jordan voting against them. Democrats have a majority on the local and state boards of elections. Because the local board was not unanimous in its decision, the state elections board will have the final say on the new polling places.
In January, the county board selected four sites for early voting: Lewisville, Kernersville, the central elections office and Carver High School.
State Reps. Larry Womble and Earline Parmon, both Forsyth County Democrats, mounted a protest effort geared at creating more sites for early voting. Parmon and Womble and about 30 people packed the meeting room of the local elections board yesterday, after a protest in front of the government center.
If approved by the state elections board, the new sites for early voting would be at the following places in Winston-Salem:
–Malloy/Jordan East Winston Heritage Center, 1110 E. Seventh St.
–Polo Park Recreation Center, 1850 Polo Road.
–Southside Library, 3185 Buchanan St.
–Winston-Salem Transportation Center, at the corner of Fifth, Trade and Liberty streets.
–Anderson Center at Winston-Salem State University.
The Polo Road site is near Wake Forest University, and the Anderson Center site is on the WSSU campus. Womble said that minority voters — many of whom lack transportation — should benefit from many of the new sites.
“We wanted to make the opportunity available to as many people as we could,” Womble said. “In the past, there have been some discriminatory practices … such as not having enough voting places.”
Under the plan approved by the elections board, early voting would begin April 17 at the central elections office and on April 28 at the other eight locations.
Jordan criticized the new plan for putting three voting stations within two miles of the central elections office, while establishing none for such areas as Rural Hall and Union Cross. Jordan said he did approve of the site at Southside Library.
Jordan also disagreed with the other board members about what procedures they should follow to get state approval for the proposed voting places. That didn’t get resolved yesterday.
Robert Coffman, the county director of elections, said that the state board would likely approve the local board’s decision if the ruling followed party lines.
— Wesley Young can be reached at 727-7369 or at wyoung@wsjournal.com.
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