Vote center study committee for Monroe County digs into work at first meeting
On Thursday evening, an 11-member voter center study committee for Monroe County met for the first time.
Vote centers are different from the kind of precinct-based polling locations currently used by Monroe County. For a precinct-based polling site, only voters from specified precincts can cast a ballot there.
Vote centers are polling places where a voter who is registered in any precinct can cast a ballot.
The committee’s job is to put together a vote center plan, with the number and locations for the voter centers to be used in Monroe County. That plan would need a unanimous vote by the three-member county election board, in order to be adopted.
A vote center system for Monroe County is not expected to be implemented in time for the 2024 election cycle. But based on Thursday’s meeting, committee members are not looking to dawdle.
They elected officers—Ilana Stonebraker as chair, Taylor Bryant as vice chair, and Ralf Shaw as secretary. They also set a schedule that calls for an every-other-Wednesday pattern, with the next meeting set for Jan. 3.
The committee also started mulling the kind of information and data that they would be asking that county staff to assemble, to inform the committee’s work on the vote center plan.
Supporting the committee in its work will be deputy clerk Kylie Moreland.
One basic kind of information the committee wants is turnout data broken down by geography—that is, by precinct. They settled on first asking for data from the elections held in the years 2016, 2018, and 2019. They were not as interested in getting data from 2020, because of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on that year’s turnout.
The committee also wanted information about challenges that other Indiana counties had experienced, when they adopted vote centers. Of Indiana’s 92 counties, 61 have already adopted vote centers.
Committee members were most interested in getting information from other counties that had recently adopted vote centers. Another priority was for counties that were similar to Monroe County—in having a concentrated urban center of population. Specifically named in that category were Vigo, St. Joseph, and Tippecanoe counties.
Monroe County’s vote center committee was created in July by the Monroe County election board, but its membership was not finalized until Thursday afternoon.
The final committee appointment was made by the election board at its regular monthly meeting, to fill one remaining slot for a voter who is unaffiliated with a political party. That appointment went to Ami Gandhi.
Three committee appointments were allocated to the county chair of the Democratic Party (Ilana Stonebraker, Evan Anish Nayee, and Steve Volan). Three were also allocated to the Republican Party chair (Taylor Bryant, William Ellis, and Danny Shields).
Five committee appointments were allocated to the Monroe County clerk, Nicole Browne.
The appointments assigned to the clerk are broken down like this: 3 who are independent of political party (Daniella Wheelock, Stacy Kowalczyk, and Ami Gandhi); 1 who is a member of the League of Women Voters (Deborah ‘Ralf’ Shaw); and 1 who “represents through lived experience and/or professional expertise with functional or access needs” (Hal Turner).
Based on committee discussion on Thursday, it is conceivable that the committee could produce a vote center plan by mid-2024.
When the election board is asked to vote on the plan, the board’s membership will be different from its current lineup. At Thursday’s board meeting, David Henry announced that he will be resigning from the board in order to run for one of the three at-large county council positions, which are up for election in 2024.
Henry is the Democratic Party’s appointee to the board. He is also the chair of the Monroe County Democratic Party. That means the selection of his board replacement will fall to Henry himself.
Henry had not intended to serve long term on the election board, when he appointed himself as Shruti Rana’s replacement, to start 2023. Rana also resigned from the board in order to run for office. In Rana’s case, it was for the District 5 city council seat, which she won.
The other two members of Monroe County’s election board are the county clerk, Nicole Browne, and Republican Party appointee Judith Benckart.
