A Good Day for Voting

Shelters and Board of Elections Did a Great Job

The Homeless Coalition with one volunteer, John, spent election day driving people to their precinct to vote. We went to East Cleveland, Euclid, Maple Heights, and Cleveland and had no problems. It is time to give out a few awards. First, John the Lawyer (no friend to Joe the Plumber by the way), gave up his day to drive homeless people all over the county. The second award goes to the Board of Elections who did a great job preparing and staffing this election here locally. We were extremely critical of the Cuyahoga Board of Elections for the 2004 and the 2006 elections, but there were no major problems with this election. The staff were prepared, and during the first week of voting everything went smoothly. Election day saw no major problems, and the staff were helpful. In 2006, I nearly got arrested because the staff were not trained sufficiently; they were understaffed; and they were not willing to listen that they were making mistakes. In 2008, the polling places were ready to go on time and staff knew what to do, and were pleasant. At the main office, they were ready for early voting and seemed to have enough staff and workers. It was rough on the weekends, but that was a problem with having only one polling place available for early voting. It might be a good idea to use the convocation center or the Higgbees building or the Medical Mart or some other large complex in 2012 for the Obama vs. Palin race.

The shelters of Cleveland also should get a gold star. Every one of the shelters made an effort to get everyone to vote. Cleveland is one of the only cities in the United States that requires the publicly funded shelters to offer registration/change of address to every person entering. This is thanks to the County Office of Homeless Services who have also asked that every shelter record how many people voted. On November 4, there were very few left who had not already voted. The staff at the shelters did a great job, and I am sure that homeless turnout in Cuyahoga County surpassed the 64% voter participation nationally in this last election. Of special recognition, the Salvation Army Harbor Light Complex helped 160 people to vote early. The Y-Haven program made sure that most of their clients voted in this election, and many also worked at the polling place on November 4. 2100 Lakeside had one staff person assigned to help with registrations and to get people to vote. The new North Point Transitional Shelter made sure that everyone in the place was registered, and the few that did not vote early walked down the street to Bohn Tower to vote. Thanks to all the shelters for working to keep homeless people engaged in the democratic process. We will collect the numbers and release those later this month.

One big criticism goes out to the Ohio State legislature for putting in place horrible rules for voting. There are so many things in the law that are confusing, stupid, useless, and backward. The whole system needs to be redesigned. We need a blue ribbon commission appointed to reform voting in Ohio, and put some dollars into improving this system. The ID provision is worthless and basically a poll tax (since ID is not free and takes months to obtain). The precinct based system does not reflect the needs to current voters, and the entire registration system is antiquated. Please change the voting laws this next year.

Brian Davis
Posts by Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless staff and Board.