Accessibility and voting polls

[Earth Mother 2 Angels]

((((((Hugs to All)))))) ~

Cat ~

My registration wasn't dropped, since the Registrar told me that my ballot had been mailed to me. She then advised me on options to allow me to vote, all of which involve more than I can manage with my responsibilities to Jim and Jon, and I don't have any friends, who can run to the county seat, about an hour from our home, on my behalf.

I'm not starting a conspiracy theory. In 20 years, my ballots have all arrived in time. This is the first year it hasn't. In 20 years, I know exactly what my absentee ballot envelope looks like. And Jim and I were ferreting through tons of political mail, because we live in highly populated area and a huge state, with a large number of candidates on the Primary ballot, plus propositions. Our ballots are very long and complicated. The amount of mail we got was unbelievable.

I'm not the only voter in my district, who didn't get an absentee ballot, and there were issues at my district's polling places. I live in a large metropolis, which is rife with county and local government corruption.

For these reasons, I am suspicious as to why I did not receive a ballot. It's not driving me crazy, but it is irritating me considerably, particularly in the face of the mid-term elections. My right to vote is very important to me.

And, if my fact-based experience is bringing out "wacky folks," well, I just don't know how to respond to that. I only shared my experience, with the parameters of where I reside and what happened in my district. I can't be in charge of how that's interpreted by the receiver.

Voter fraud is a real thing, and I may have been a victim of it. Now, after all of these years, I have to determine how to protect my right to vote. Any option other than an absentee ballot presents obstacles for me to cast my vote. Those options are very discriminatory toward voters with disabilities, and/or who are elderly. I feel that my concern is reasonable and warranted.



Love & Light,



Rose

[funnylegs4]

((((((Hugs to All)))))) ~

For Cat, and any others, who may not know what happened to me during the Primary election, here is my account from the politics thread:




In California, we have an open primary, which means the primary ballot contains every candidate from every party for every voter.

Here’s an article explaining why that could be problematic, especially in the 2020 election:

Only registered and activated users can see links., Click Here To Register...

I can’t describe the volume of flyers, letters, circulars, and phone calls I’ve received in the past 30 days. It’s incredible. And maybe somewhere among all of that junk mail, my absentee ballot was hidden.

Because I don’t have my ballot, and I am a permanent absentee ballot voter.

I called the Registrar of Voters, and I was told that my ballot was mailed on 5/7. Without it my options were: a) I could go to the county seat and get an emergency ballot; b) send someone to the county seat to get my emergency ballot; c) find an early voting location and go there to vote; d) vote at my polling place on June 5.

I asked, “What if I’m unable to do any of these things?”

The answer was, “I can’t help you.”

I’m furious and disgusted. I have never not received my ballot. What happens to it after it leaves my mail box with the mail carrier, who knows?

All of these flyers I receive indicate my party preference, so maybe someone in the post office might just notice that and accidentally lose my ballot?

Am I paranoid? Do I live in America, in a conservative county?

Yeah.

******************

To this, I will add that Jim and I went through every flyer and other pieces of junk mail every day, because we were looking for my ballot.

I think I'll call the Registrar in October to find out exactly when my ballot will be mailed for the mid-terms. If I don't receive it within a few days of that date, I will call again. If I have to do it, I'll go to early voting polls to avoid crowds. Of course, that is dependent upon what's happening with Jim and Jon, which is unpredictable from day to day, let alone 3 months from now. That is why I vote absentee.

Love & Light,



Rose

As a person who loves being involved in the voting process I am disturbed this happened to you regardless of party. It should not be that easy for a ballot to get lost.

[Sunshine]

I don’t think it’s paranoid. It happened in another city a few years ago, post office employee selectively threw out mail attempting to register, or do something that required mailing. They arrived one day late because an errant employee made sure they were late.

Can you find that news story?

[Sunshine]

Here it is
Only registered and activated users can see links., Click Here To Register...

They delayed delivery of DACA application, screwing the applicant. Sent it all around the city for a few days,

[Catdancer]

One lost absentee ballot does not equate to a conspiracy. However inconvenienced Rose was, there were other ways to vote. There were not other ways for the DACA folks to resolve this.....and there were many more than one person, who had for years gotten her ballot in the mail. If it happens say n, you might convince me that something is going on. But not once.

[stillstANNding]

This feels contentious and it need not be.

ANN

[agate]

Rose's ballot didn't reach her in the mail, but I think her main point was that it wasn't possible for her to vote in any other way:

I called the Registrar of Voters, and I was told that my ballot was mailed on 5/7. Without it my options were: a) I could go to the county seat and get an emergency ballot; b) send someone to the county seat to get my emergency ballot; c) find an early voting location and go there to vote; d) vote at my polling place on June 5.

I asked, “What if I’m unable to do any of these things?”

The answer was, “I can’t help you.”

I'm sure that absentee ballots do go astray in the mail sometimes. There ought to be a way she could have dealt with it, even if the election headquarters had to send a ballot to her by one of those handy ways of getting a piece of mail to you fast.

The people in charge of such things might argue that (a) that would be costly, and/or (b) that they'd need some assurance that the person calling them to report never receiving a ballot wasn't just going to be voting twice--that is, lying while planning to send in a second ballot.

The answer to (a) is that yes, it might be expensive but we're talking about a Voter here. A VOTE that could have been cast but wasn't due to no fault on the voter's part.

The answer to (b) is that all of those ballots have to be signed by the voter, and I'm pretty sure that modern technology has ways of going through them to make sure that no person's signature turns up twice.

It sounds to me as if the person Rose got on the phone just plain didn't want to bother. Maybe that person had a political motivation for not wanting to bother--it's entirely possible.

If this ever happens again, Rose, I'd insist on talking to someone else there and keep insisting until someone comes up with a solution. There must be quite a few people with this kind of situation. I can think of several right here in this building who couldn't do any of the options you were given.

[funnylegs4]

Rose's ballot didn't reach her in the mail, but I think her main point was that it wasn't possible for her to vote in any other way:



I'm sure that absentee ballots do go astray in the mail sometimes. There ought to be a way she could have dealt with it, even if the election headquarters had to send a ballot to her by one of those handy ways of getting a piece of mail to you fast.

The people in charge of such things might argue that (a) that would be costly, and/or (b) that they'd need some assurance that the person calling them to report never receiving a ballot wasn't just going to be voting twice--that is, lying while planning to send in a second ballot.

The answer to (a) is that yes, it might be expensive but we're talking about a Voter here. A VOTE that could have been cast but wasn't due to no fault on the voter's part.

The answer to (b) is that all of those ballots have to be signed by the voter, and I'm pretty sure that modern technology has ways of going through them to make sure that no person's signature turns up twice.

It sounds to me as if the person Rose got on the phone just plain didn't want to bother. Maybe that person had a political motivation for not wanting to bother--it's entirely possible.

If this ever happens again, Rose, I'd insist on talking to someone else there and keep insisting until someone comes up with a solution. There must be quite a few people with this kind of situation. I can think of several right here in this building who couldn't do any of the options you were given.

My guess it would be option B that they are more concerned about as that would be voter fraud. This is why some people are for photo voting ID. In the case of mail ballots however photo voting ID might not do much good unless the person mails a copy of the photo ID or something with the 2nd ballot to verify but of course people can get fake ID etc.

[renee]

Geez, i'm a poll inspector in what has become a fairly affluent town since the Reagan years
and for all the money that floats around, the local govetnment is brain dense about heavy doors
and curbcuts.
Looking like a po'd worker on the verge of death helps as well as being able to
demonstrate the reasons for a lawsuit may actually have helped produce a few
changes in accessibility.

Bless you, Catdancer.
It's hard not to love that southern thing.

[Earth Mother 2 Angels]

Ballot Update

((((((Hugs to All)))))) ~

Today, I spoke with our mail carrier regarding my absentee ballot. I asked her to keep an eye out for it, and to make sure that it's on top of the junk mail, so we see it immediately. I told her that I didn't receive my absentee ballot for the primary.

She said, "Several of my customers have told me that they didn't get their primary ballot. There are probably more, who I haven't talked to yet. But one of my customers told me that he didn't get his absentee ballot, and he went to the polling place on Election Day. He told the poll workers that he didn't get his absentee ballot, and they told him that 'many, many voters' had told them the same thing."

She also said that she is an absentee voter and has been looking for her ballot too. She has delivered "a few, very few" ballots already.

She assured me that she would keep an eye out for my ballot and would walk it up to the door to hand to me, if I want her to do that. That would be great!

I have no reason to disbelieve her, so it would seem that a lot of us didn't get our primary absentee ballots.

When things settle down a little on the homefront, I'm going to call the Registrar to find out when my ballot was or will be mailed.

If I don't get my ballot, I will have to go to the polls, because I cannot miss the mid-terms vote. It infuriates me that I have to sleuth out my ballot to exercise my right to vote. And even worse, that I may have to go to the polls and stand in line for hours. If it is more than an hour, I will have to leave, because my back cannot tolerate standing any longer than an hour. I imagine there will be a big turnout, especially in our district, where we have an important house seat up for grabs, and one side is putting out false attack ads against the other. Guess which side I'm on?

In the primary, our district had voter machine problems, provisional ballot problems, inaccessibility for blind and disabled voters, and evidently many absentee voters, who did not receive their ballots. It sure feels like voter suppression to me.



Love & Light,



Rose

[Sunshine]

Call the local Democrat Party headquarters and tell them what happened to you and what your carrier said. They have a vested interest in hearing you.

[Earth Mother 2 Angels]

((((((Sunshine)))))) ~

Thank you! Great suggestion! I will do that!

Love & Light,



Rose

[Earth Mother 2 Angels]

I Can Vote!

((((((Hugs to All)))))) ~

Last Thursday, I called the Registrar and was told that my ballot had been mailed and that it should arrive in 2 days. It did. My ballot arrived today.

YAY!

The ballot is LONG. We are voting for:

Governor; Lt. Governor; Secretary of State; Controller; Treasurer; Attorney General; Insurance Commissioner; State Board of Equalization member; Superintendent of Public Instruction; State Assembly Member.

U.S. Senator; U.S. House of Representatives. (1 each.)

16 Associate Justices. (I have no idea who these judges are, of course. So, our vote is based on their campaign paragraph in the voter pamphlet. Not all of the candidates supply even that.)

County Supervisor; County District Attorney; County Sheriff/Coroner. (I wouldn’t vote for any of these candidates to drive our trash truck. They are all corrupt liars.)

11 Complicated Propositions. (All of them are written by vested interest groups, naturally. They are often written to be confusing, as in: if you vote yes, it really means no.)

If I start right this second and read every single day until Nov. 6, maybe I’ll have it all figured out by then.

We’re a giant state, so we have a huge ballot. I think this deters people from voting, because they are overwhelmed by the number of votes they have to cast and the number of people/issues they need to study. However, I’m sure most people vote on party lines and don’t even read the propositions. Another flaw in this system.

I feel that it would be more effective if California held separate elections for Propositions, at least, apart from General Elections. We could also have separate County/City elections. Both of these could be exclusively absentee ballots ~ no voting polls.

For now, we’re stuck with this …

I’m very happy that my ballot is here.

I treasure my right to vote, and I cast every ballot in honor of the women, who died so that I could have this right.

Love & Light,



Rose

[nuthatch]

I got my absentee ballot in the mail yesterday too, although my husband got his voter stuff & sample ballot more than a week ago. Hmmmm . . . !

[agate]

No ballot yet but so far two very very thick voters' pamphlets. The ballots here can be very complicated too.