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Possibility of moving polls meets pushback

HUGHESVILLE — The proposal to move local polling sites to area schools was met with push back from some of the public at the East Lycoming School Board meeting this week.

Dr. Mark Stamm, superintendent, presented the request from the Lycoming County commissioners, suggesting schools could be used for polling places due to their accessibility.

“It’s coming about as a result from the Department of Justice as a settlement agreement with the county regarding accessibility issues around voting precincts,” Stamm said.

“Some of the places where they are currently operating, be they fire halls, churches or other public locations, are not

accessible,” Stamm said. “So the county is giving options to either make them all accessible or find new locations.”

One of the concerns Stamm raised was safety; he wondered how the district could control the flow of voters, volunteers, election officials and other people who might be in and out on election days.

“There is kind of a universal understanding among the county superintendents that this is something that we’re going to have to kind of allow to happen. We are going to have to close schools those days,” he added.

“We made it clear to the commissioners that this could not happen during this school year. Our school calendar is set so that would actually be for the next voting cycle. But it would be two days during the year that we would have to start building into our calendar, when we are simply closed. It is not a time when you want kids in the building, nor even staff. We’ll be closed. They can have access to it and utilize the facility and we will simply pick up the next day,” Stamm said.

One resident reminded the board that the goal of the district is educating children.

“I would encourage you to not lose sight of that goal,” he said.

“While balancing the responsibility to the public — I don’t know how that plays out — but I also think, aside from safety issues, hiding the voting process from our kids isn’t necessarily the best thing either,” he said. “Disrupting the school calendar for that … if it was my choice, I don’t think I would do that.”

Another parent suggested using the fire department instead of the school and questioned whether parents would have a say in the final decision.

Stamm noted that the polling site could be at any of the district’s schools and would be based on where the precincts are located.

“The commissioners and the head of Lycoming Voting Services assured me that they are not allowed to do that (merge all sites into one). They still have to be within the geographic region to bring it to this school,” he said.

There have been preliminary discussions, Stamm said, but nothing has been finalized.

He emphasized that the final decision is out of the district’s control.

“On one hand, I agree with it. We have a nice facility. It is accessible … Other than it’s a two-day disruption to our school calendar, it really doesn’t cost us anything to do it, and if it’s a service to the community, I think that’s great,” he said.

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