Long waits biggest problem at most polling places (Cleveland)

[eablair3]

from the Cleveland Plain Dealer -

Long waits biggest problem at most polling places

Wednesday, November 03, 2004

Scott Hiaasen, Diane Suchetka and John Mangels
Plain Dealer Reporters

Voters across Ohio found long lines and ugly weather but largely avoided the vote challenges and calamities that many worried would mar the most closely scrutinized election in memory.

Elections officials reported a record number of Ohio voters, some of whom waited in a chilly drizzle for more than four hours to cast their ballots. A swell of late-arriving voters kept the polls open late in some areas including Oberlin, where scores of college students stood in line as late as 10 p.m.

...

Near Columbus, some voters waited in line as long as five hours, and Democratic lawyers persuaded a federal judge to force election officials in Franklin and Knox counties to provide different voting machines to move the lines more quickly.

...

When Cleveland Mayor Jane Campbell went to vote at Woodbury Elementary School, she found voters waiting in line for up to 2½ hours to vote in one Ward 4 precinct with no lines at any other precincts. While volunteers passed out doughnuts and water, Campbell called the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections to complain.

"They need twice as many voting machines," Campbell said.

By late afternoon, the elections board had installed an extra 500 voting machines to help ease the backlog at busy precincts, including Woodbury

snip

http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/1099478326312880.xml


Why do the long lines always seem to occur in urban and in minority areas? How many people didn't vote in those areas due to the wait?

Are there any reports out there that the rural and predominantly caucasian areas had to wait 5 hours to vote?

[lakeguy]

1. silly question but how could they not have expected

this? i gather SOMEONE must have know how many people were registered and what odds there were of a certain number of people showing up. oops, silly me, we don't want just ANYONE to vote!

[screembloodymurder]

2. Seems like the heavily Democratic areas had long lines

So long that people gave up waiting.

[OhioChick]

3. Exactly......

Didn't seem to be a problem with lines in the Repuke polling areas.....

[flygal]

20. Why wasn't this investigated by the dems in Ohio before the election...

did they not think that dem districts would have this problem? Can't help but think their SoS set this whole thing up.

[Cobalt Violet]

4. This is unexceptable.

It worked for them so expect the long line to spread to other Dem. heavy areas. Mostly swing states.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

5. You're answering your own question.

Rural is rural. (Less populated)

Urban is urban. (population center)

The real question is why would folks stand in the "chilly drizzle for more than four hours" to do what has never happened before...give an horrible president a "mandate?"

[kikiek]

6. If they can say you have to have a certain amount of time off on

election day to vote, why isn't there one that says you have to be able to vote within the time frame allowed? What we need is a group of people that are sent out way in advance to check that machines are working right, and that there are enough to allow people to vote in a timely fashion. Not to mention their accuracy.

[demgrrrll]

7. Long lines are a form of voter supression and I would bet that the

lines were the longest in heavily democratic areas.

[llmart]

8. They were......

and it wasn't just an "accident." This was done purposely. They had 4 years to get this in place. Why did my little township of mostly Repugs have paper ballots and many places to sit and fill them out when precincts in Dem urban areas and college campuses have only two machines for masses of people? It was all designed to happen like this. It was fixed and we know it.

[Dancing_Dave]

15. What are we going to do about???

This is the most systematic and widespread vote suppression campaign we've seen in this country. It worked in Ohio--partly because working people can't get enough time off to wait in line that long.

WE NEED TO BRING PEOPLE INVOLVED IN THIS VOTE SUPPRESSION CAMPAING TO JUSTICE.

Whatever happened to all those Democratic lawyers who were supposedly standing by to investigate vote fraud? It happened on a massive scale, so WHAT ARE THEY DOING???

[daydreamer]

18. could anybody figure out how people did not get to vote

Because of the long wait????

[high density]

9. This is an outrage

Voting should not take hours, it should take no longer than fifteen minutes or a half hour at most. This is America after all, not some third world country (yet).

[0007]

10. Did the repukes jam the lines to hold the polls open while

the analyst fixed the numbers while the news commentator and evaluators waited for information? I think so!

[JusticeForAll]

11. Voter suppression and disenfranchisement of the poor

This is our biggest issue going into 2008. I am so sick of hearing the evangelicals claiming that they got their fundies to the polls.

We got our voters to the polls, too, but the literal hours they were FORCED to wait in rain and cold, or rain, heat and humidity turned them off. The left to go raise their healthcare-less kids, and to work at their two or three jobs to keep their families just above the brink of abject poverty.

My anger is renewed. Once again "justice for all" is a farce for this country.

[snippy]

12. Election reform is the first issue democrats should focus on.

This is fresh in everyones' minds and the GOP is vulnerable on this issue since there are so many stories of republicans attempting to suppress minority voters. Republicans hate having the truth be told about the rampant bigotry and racism in the GOP and would have a hard time defending trying to continue to disenfranchise minorities. They will look bad if they oppose election reform.

There is no reason that an election reform bill can not be the very first thing passed by the next Congress. But the democrats have to make it an important issue.

[jmcgowanjm]

13. Palast says election being stolen in Ohio and New Mexico

I need help finding SoCalDems site.
Rense's link doesn't work.

Like our elections.

http://rense.com/general59/steI.HTM
  http://www.ilcaonline.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=887&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0

The CNN Exit Poll data on the CNN web site was later changed.
Between 1:05 and 6:41am

http://www.buzzflash.com/analysis/04/11/ana04025.html

[jmcgowanjm]

14. Kerry's concession was a slap in the face

You know, like the Weak Leader who concedes
while the battle is at it's height.

And usually you can find some Wormtongue
next to the Weak Leader advising concession.

John Kerry's quickie concession in the midst of several
states rife with voter intimidation that were deemed too close
to call, was a slap in the face to those who stood out in the
rain for hours to vote for him.

http://www.politicalstrategy.org/archives/000759.php

This election is being stolen.
Fuck Kerry. Fight for what's yours.
When we win, we'll put our own people in.

[LisaL]

16. And why were there lines?

I was in an hour long line (in the rain) in Columbus OH.
The turnout was higher, but not 10 fold higher.
When I voted for Gore in 2000 in Columbus OH, there were hardly any people there. I voted at exactly same time (morning around 9 am) There were absolutely no lines.
So, what gives?
:nuke:

[Robert Oak]

17. this is voter represssion

rural areas, walk right in and vote your gay bashing measure

democratic areas: stand in line for 10 hours. How many left
because they had to?

I say the oregon system should be used nationwide.

It's the fairest to working people. You fill out your ballot,
you can take up to 2 weeks and you drop it off or mail it in.

Works great, people can think because they choose.

[C_U_L8R]

19. Here in NYC

At my polling place, which isn't even in a battleground area, there were only two voting machines and three poll workers. In past years, there was a bank of machines and dozens of workers. Needless to say the line was around the block. I suspected something was fishy and called the voting hotline as soon as I got home. I don't know if there was something planned to slow the vote... but the poll staffing sure defied logic and reason
(the population in my neighborhood has been growing and everyone expected high turnout).

As they always say.. if you control the polling place (and the counting), you win.