A short conversation at a polling place put an immediate damper on Margaret Forbes’ voting experience.
Forbes, who has a disability preventing her from voting inside a polling place, uses curbside voting to cast her ballot. She’s done so without major issues in Tarrant County before. But when Forbes went to vote curbside at the UNT Health Science Center in Fort Worth’s Cultural District, she ran into an issue she’d never heard of before.
While talking with an election worker, Forbes mentioned that she’d previously had a ballot get messed up because of misty conditions.
“She said, ‘Oh well, we just tell people we can’t do anything. We can’t bring this machine outside if it’s raining,’” Forbes said, recounting her conversation with the poll worker. “Are you kidding me?”
It was bright and sunny when Forbes headed to UNTHSC on Oct. 29, so the issue of rain was a moot point. But it concerned her that other people with disabilities may have their ability to cast a ballot taken away because of weather conditions outside of their control. Forbes said she tried to call the elections office and file a complaint, only to be told they didn’t take complaints over the phone.
“I tried to describe the lady who had told me, ‘We don’t bring the voting machine out in the rain,’” Forbes told the Report. “No, that is against the law. You can’t say, ‘Oh, you’re disabled, so we’re going to tell you to come back when it’s not raining.’”
How to file a voting-related complaint
The Tarrant County Elections office is taking complaints both in-person and over the phone. To file a complaint via phone, call 817-831-8683. The county’s email address for election-related issues is ElectionsInfo@tarrantcountytx.gov.
Poll workers interviewed by the Report on Oct. 29 confirmed they had been instructed by Tarrant County Elections administration to keep the curbside voting machines from getting wet. During rainy conditions, the poll workers said they tell those seeking to vote curbside to try to come inside the polling place to cast a ballot — if they’re physically unable to come inside, poll workers ask them to come back after the rain stops.
Loretta Handeman, the election clerk lead at the Como Community Center, has been a poll worker for 30 years. She said she’s always had to turn away curbside voters during rainy conditions.
“If it was storming all day, it would be the same situation,” Handeman said when asked what would happen if it rained all day on Election Day. “You can’t bring that machine in the rain at all. It can’t get wet.”
BK, the election clerk lead at UNTHSC, echoed Handeman’s comments, saying that if it’s raining, or even misting, curbside voters are asked to wait or come back after the rain stops to cast their ballots. Fortunately, she added, only three people had attempted to vote curbside at UNTHSC as of Oct. 29.
The Report contacted Tarrant County Elections on Oct. 29 with a list of questions seeking clarification on whether the curbside voting machines can get wet; what county protocol is for when people want to vote curbside during rainy conditions; and how the county’s elections office is preparing for the possibility of rainy weather on Election Day, Nov. 5.
In response to the Report’s inquiry, Elections Administrator Clint Ludwig shared an Oct. 30 memo he sent to all early voting and Election Day poll workers emphasizing that curbside voting must be offered regardless of weather.
“We understand that there is the potential for rain during early voting and on election day,” Ludwig wrote in the memo, which his office provided to the Report. “We want to remind all locations that in accordance with Sec 64.009 of the Texas Election Code, curbside voting must be provided at all polling locations. We want everyone to take the necessary steps to stay safe and dry while still providing this invaluable and required service to the voting community.”
As of Oct. 31, the National Weather Service is forecasting mostly sunny conditions with a 30% chance of rain in the morning on Election Day in the Fort Worth area. Ludwig wrote in a statement to the Report on Oct. 31 that Tarrant County Elections has provided umbrellas to all the early voting locations and has umbrellas for the Election Day judges to grab when they pick up their supply bags.
Voting and disability rights experts interviewed by the Report said rain or other weather conditions do not permit poll workers or elections officials to limit curbside voting. Elections offices can provide plastic covers or other forms of protection for voting machines, they said.
Michelle Bishop, manager for voter access and engagement with the National Disability Rights Network, said many polling places are already not compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Curbside voting offers a lifeline for residents who wouldn’t be able to cast a ballot otherwise, and elections officials should have a clear plan of action for when weather conditions change.
“Elections officials tend to have a plan, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, for just about everything, because when you get to Election Day, you’ve got one day to get it right, and if you don’t, you can end up being sued,” she said. “You can end up in the news, all kinds of things you don’t want as an election official.”
Sending voters away should always be an option of last resort, Bishop added. All voters have a federal right to a private and independent ballot under the Help America Vote Act, she said.
“Sending a voter away, especially if it is Election Day, and it’s the last opportunity to get your vote cast, can have a lot of consequences for voters,” she said. “We simply don’t know if they’ll be able to come back, or what it took for the voter to get to the polling place in the first place.”
Molly Broadway, a training and technical support specialist with Disability Rights Texas, said she’s heard of similar instances in other areas where poll workers didn’t offer curbside voting because of weather concerns.
Earlier this week, Bell County elections officials announced they would suspend curbside voting if it was actively raining. Broadway noted that Bell County reached a settlement agreement with the Department of Justice in July after an investigation found many of its polling places were inaccessible to people with disabilities. Hays County also reached a similar settlement agreement in September.
“I think it’s also probably some miscommunication or misunderstanding on the election workers part as well,” Broadway said of the curbside voting situation in Tarrant. “Because you can feed people so much information, but whether or not it sinks in is another situation. I think sometimes, you’re sitting through this training, it’s a lot of information, and so maybe not everything just sticks.”
Have you had issues voting as a person with a disability?
Disability Rights Texas offers a free phone line to help voters with disabilities navigate barriers to voting. You can reach it by dialing 1-888-796-VOTE (8683) or by email at vote@drtx.org.
Christina Das, counsel for Black Voters on the Rise with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund Inc., said she has seen many counties successfully offer curbside voting during rainy conditions by using tools like large umbrellas or plastic tarps.
She said she wishes Ludwig’s memo to poll workers, which the Report provided for her review, included specific guidance on how to keep the voting machines dry during rain because she doesn’t want that step left to interpretation.
“I assume good faith on the part of (Ludwig) and the Tarrant County Elections department … but I think that more guidance is helpful,” Das said.
When approached Oct. 31 with questions about whether Tarrant County Elections administration had provided resources or clear instructions on how to prevent voting machines from getting wet in the rain, Handeman, the Como Community Center poll worker, told the Report she had been instructed by elections administration not to speak with reporters.
Brad Anderson, the election clerk lead at Texas Christian University’s on-campus polling place, said that in addition to Ludwig’s memo, elections administration delivered a large umbrella to the campus polling place Oct. 30. In previous years, when he was a poll worker at Tanglewood Elementary School, Anderson brought his own umbrella to prepare for weather conditions.
When he received the memo from Ludwig about the legal requirement to offer curbside voting, Anderson’s immediate thought was, “Well, of course.”
He added that he hasn’t experienced rain-related issues at the TCU polling place but has faced technical challenges in learning how to efficiently operate the curbside voting machines. Like UNTHSC, the TCU polling location has only seen a handful of voters wanting to cast a ballot curbside on campus, Anderson said.
Das said poll workers can do their part to ensure curbside voting runs smoothly on Election Day regardless of weather conditions. If elections officials do not provide resources like umbrellas to poll workers, the poll workers themselves can seek out tools and hopefully get reimbursed by the county later, she said.
“Poll workers are doing such a big job already, but I would suggest … to have a plan B,” she said.
At the end of the day, Bishop said, the buck stops with elections administration.
“I think it’s probably just about as complicated as solving any other polling place access issue, unfortunately,” she said. “But I do think the onus is on the elections officials to have plans in place.”
Cecilia Lenzen and Emily Wolf are government accountability reporters for the Fort Worth Report. Contact them at cecilia.lenzen@fortworthreport.org and emily.wolf@fortworthreport.org.
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