Supervisor Dent responds to voter frustration

The Green Room at Twin Lakes Park was packed with poll workers June 13, as the public learned about changes in precincts and polling places in a Town Hall presentation given by Supervisor of Elections Kathy Dent.

Dent, speaking without the assistance of a microphone to a crowd of more than 100, gave a brief presentation on the new precinct numbers and explained the impetus behind reducing the number of precincts from 156 to 98 and polling places from 127 to 85.

Staff from the office of the Supervisor of Elections had laptops set up to help attendees glean where their polling location is, but a majority of the forum was dedicated to fighting criticism about voter disenfranchisement.

“How many polling places did they close on Longboat Key, Siesta Key and St. Armands Circle?” asked one retired attendee, raising the question regarding voting in affluent communities.

“Well, it would have been hard to close any on Longboat since we only have one,” Dent responded.
She went on to lament the media coverage of negative attitudes regarding reprecincting, saying the arguments about voter disenfranchisement were not the view of the majority.

“Sir, are you a poll worker?” one poll worker asked. “The reason I’m asking is because the poll workers can handle it, this is not a problem.”

Dent says although the timing of the repricincting may have been inconvenient and she would have hoped for more public input prior to taking the issue to the Sarasota County Commission, but Florida was the second-to-last state to have its congressional state lines approved.

After that approval, which happened April 30, Dent had eight days to get the revised precinct data to the Sarasota County Commission. Commissioners had two weeks to review the new precinct and polling location data before the May 22 regular meeting, in which they voted to approve the changes.

“We were in a (time) crunch and, unfortunately, that’s just the way it was,” Dent said, noting that the office budget supported only a few members of her staff to work on reprecincting.

Antoine Henry, the geographic information systems administrator for the Supervisor of Elections, received a round of applause after an introduction from Dent.

Dent used the Town Hall meeting as an opportunity to encourage early and absentee voting, as well as dispel rumors.

“In November, we’re going to have 11 constitutional amendments on the ballot,” she said. “I’ve got a husband who’s an attorney and daughter who’s an attorney, and I consider myself fairly bright, but we’re going to have to sit down and have a powwow as to what these amendments actually say.”

Voters are allowed to bring marked sample ballots, which will be sent out to every eligible voter this summer.

Dent explained that during the last two primaries only 27% of eligible voters came to polling places on Election Day.

“Please don’t be insulted if you don’t work the primary,” Dent told the audience. “That’s one of the things we’ve tried to do in this economic climate: save money where we can.”

Following Gov. Rick Scott’s recent push to purge illegal voters, Town Hall attendees also questioned Dent about the number of non-U.S. citizens voting in Sarasota County. Sarasota County was given a list of 14 voters who are possible non-U.S. citizens. But, there is little Dent’s office can do other than send letters asking for proof of citizenship.

“I can’t take someone off (the list of eligible voters) just because they don’t respond (to a letter),” she said. “And, more than likely they’re not in Sarasota County anymore.”

“None of us likes change, but this is the time we had to do this because of all the other changes that were handed to us,” Dent said. “And, I might add, handed to us at the last minute.”

Crunch time
April 30 — Congressional state lines approved.
May 8 — Sarasota County Commission receives reprecincting data.
May 22 — New precincts approved by Sarasota County Commission.
June — Town Hall meetings are held.
June/July — New voter information cards will be mailed out.
Aug. 14 — Primary elections will be held.
Nov. 6 — General election takes place.