Absentee ballots give voters an opportunity to vote at their own pace, without the pressure of the long line behind them. They can have the data they have collected on the issues and the candidates at their side to refer to.

By JAMES W. WADE III

Staff Reporter

The Cuyahoga County Board of Elections split along party lines over using its current voting-by-mail plan. The decision will now go to Republican Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted to break the tie.

Under a new state law that goes into effect Sept. 30, boards of elections would be prevented from sending unsolicited applications to all registered voters, paying return postage on the applications and paying postage for the completed ballots.

Democratic board members Inajo Davis Chappell and Sandy McNair praised the vote-by-mail plan, saying it helped residents and election workers. Republicans Jeff Hastings and Deborah Sutherland voted against the plan.

The law would have a huge effect in Cuyahoga County, where 47 percent of the more than 416,000 people who voted in the 2010 general election cast absentee ballots.

Since 2006, the Cuyahoga County board has mailed absentee ballot applications to every voter in the county; a move that supporters say has helped eliminate long lines at the ballot box, eased Election Night hassles and served thousands of elderly and disabled residents.

Cuyahoga County Executive Ed FitzGerald expressed disappointment today with a directive from Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted that orders boards of elections throughout Ohio to stop mailing unsolicited absentee ballot applications to all registered voters.

The directive was received by the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections within moments of FitzGerald issuing a letter to Husted asking him to break a 2-to-2 tie vote of the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections.

By mailing absentee voting applications to all registered voters, the Vote by Mail Program is intended to voting easier in Cuyahoga County and reduce lines at the polls.

“This is taking a step backwards in terms of ballot access,” FitzGerald said of the secretary of state’s directive. “We should be doing what we can to make voting easier in Ohio.”

Absentee ballots give voters an opportunity to vote at their own pace, without the pressure of the long line behind them. They can have the data they have collected on the issues and the candidates at their side to refer to.

State Senator Nina Turner and State Senator Sandra Williams both sent in letters of support to keep the vote by mail in place. Clarification came from McNair that he will send in that Cuyahoga County the poll workers will still be able to assist the voters with instructions on where to go for their precinct.

Numerous people came to testify on behalf of keeping the vote by mail, including Congresswoman Marcia Fudge’s Intergovernmental Relations Anita Gray, who spoke to keep the vote by mail.

“If you keep this vote by mail in place it may be small, but it will be a meaningful way to keep good faith with Cuyahoga County,” said Carol Gibson. Hamilton County Board of Elections split on a vote Friday afternoon on whether to send absentee-ballot applications to every county voter – weeks before a law that bars them from doing so goes into effect.

Gov. John Kasich signed HB 194, which changed a variety of state election laws, on July 5.

One provision barred counties from sending out mass mailings of absentee ballot applications, as Hamilton County has done. Supporters of the bill argued that dozens of smaller and rural Ohio counties do not have the money to do that. If all counties are not mailing out such ballots, no counties should be doing it, they argued. Opponents said it eases the burden on election workers, who in the past, were deluged with phone requests for absentee-ballot applications.

Some suggest that clearly this has been an attempt by Republican Party to suppress and reduce the vote. “If you make it harder for many people to vote, you are basically trying to reduce how many people vote," said Joanne Tate.

If Husted says the board should not put the applications in the mail, a voter that would like to vote by absentee ballot will have to request it online or by calling the Cuyahoga County Board of Election. That costs the board of elections 44 cents per application.