NEW HANOVER COUNTY — Voters will be able to cast their ballot at just one polling place in this year’s municipal election, compared to four in 2023, as approved by the newly sworn-in New Hanover County Board of Elections Tuesday night.
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The early voting plan received unanimous approval, as required by the state, despite apprehension from the board’s new Democratic minority, former board chair Derrick Miller and returning member James Battle Morgan Jr. Both were reappointed by the State Board of Elections, while two Republicans were appointed as well, John Lyon and Beverly Setz. State Auditor Dave Boliek appointed Republican Jamie Getty as chair.
With additional hours, the plan is one step up from the statutory requirements of one voting site (either the board of elections office or a site in-lieu of it) open 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. beginning on Thursday, Oct. 16, and ending on Saturday, Nov. 1. The last Saturday’s hours must be 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.
However, the adopted plan is one step down from Elections Director Rae Hunter-Havens’ proposal, which added additional weekend hours and some availability at a second polling place, Carolina Beach Town Hall.
The BOE voted to keep the additional hours, but not the additional site, despite the Town of Carolina Beach being the only municipality to request a satellite location.
The voting site will be at the Northeast Library, but adding the hours of noon to 5 p.m. on the second Saturday of the early voting period.
The library, the BOE’s former home base before getting new digs at the NHC Government Center, was chosen in-lieu of the BOE’s office. Despite the new 7,500 square feet, $5.6 million building opening October 2024, Hunter-Havens said the library provides a larger space for voting and the BOE’s absentee ballot meetings.
Hunter-Havens explained this year’s plan would be a return to pre-2021, when the county operated many municipal elections with only one early voting site. The early voting plan changed in 2021 to three sites and then added another in 2023.
The county also had around 80,000 fewer registered voters in 2021, though this number is inclusive of New Hanover County residents who don’t reside in a municipality and thus can’t vote this fall.
The plan removes three previously used early voting sites — Carolina Beach Town Hall, Cape Fear Community College and the NHC Senior Resource Center — open during the 2023 municipal election, albeit the additional locations had fewer hours. Hunter-Havens explained her plan was informed by the $261,000 reduction in planned operating costs imposed by the county upon the new fiscal year.
“I had to go back through my requested budget to see where can I find those savings and can I cut expenses, but certainly the board has the statutory authority to adopt an early voting plan that you deem appropriate,” Hunter-Havens said.
Hunter-Havens and Miller, the former board chair, have been at odds with county leadership in the months leading up to and following the budget approval. Hunter-Havens forewarned the public in June that the county’s adopted budget was putting election integrity at risk due to the amount of crucial staff affected; she also said the BOE would most likely be able to staff just one voting site.
Staffing the Northeast Library site would be nearly $23,000, while the Carolina Beach site would be almost $7,000. Both costs would be reimbursed to the BOE, though Hunter-Havens noted this still didn’t change the amount of money the BOE needed to cut from operating expenses, affecting how much they could front the municipalities.
Though Hunter-Havens’ solution was to cut voting sites, she told the BOE Tuesday they could choose to cut hours or cut early voting days as long as they met state minimums. Any of the options would have cut down on payments to casual part-time staff hired to be election workers.
“My gut position, I feel that the more access, the better, and particularly when people have become used to it, and because we’ve had multiple sites,” Morgan said Tuesday. “I think sometimes people get confused and frustrated thinking that I usually vote at this spot. I mean, we have to do what we can do within budget. We have to be reasonable, but I think, to the broader access, that would be desirable.”
Miller said he was concerned about impeding voter accessibility, particularly the downtown Wilmington demographic who may rely more on public transportation, if the board only opened one site.
“In the last two elections, we had early voting sites in downtown Wilmington, and I believe, and as we’ve discussed over the recent years, the last two municipal elections, we’ve had it there as well,” Miller said. “That is a very important site.”
The BOE has typically used CFCC’s Health Sciences building, but Hunter-Havens said her staff proposed using the McLeod Building instead this year. There’s more space for casting ballots, she said, along with more parking. CFCC was amenable to the switch, Hunter-Havens said, but the BOE halted negotiations after learning of the county’s overall budget cuts.
Republicans Lyon and Setz remarked the voter turnout during municipal elections wasn’t enough to justify multiple sites.
Newly appointed Republican member John Lyon originally motioned to go with the statutory requirements only, but it failed to gain a second. He then amended the motion to accept Hunter-Havens’ plan, but without the Carolina Beach site.
“I have worked as a poll official in the Carolina Beach midterm elections; you sit and do nothing, nobody comes in to vote during early voting,” Setz said.
The director added historical data shows voter turnout in the county’s municipal elections is higher on Election Day compared to the early voting period, though early voting is on the rise. Hunter-Havens said it has risen from 4,191 in 2019 to 9,600 in 2021 to 8,080 in 2023.
Miller said turnout at the site was likely to change if only two sites across NHC were open.
Still, Lyon couldn’t be convinced and originally made a motion to adopt a plan that just met the statutory requirements. When it failed to gain a second, he amended the motion to adopt Hunter-Havens’ plan, albeit without the Carolina Beach site.
“I’m not in favor of multiple, whether it’s one more or multiple early voting sites,” Lyon said, suggesting it would be unfair for Carolina Beach to have one but not the other municipalities.
Ultimately outnumbered, Miller said he saw Lyon’s amended motion as a compromise and, therefore, could support it.
If the plan were to fail to gain the unanimous approval needed, BOE members would have had to send multiple proposals to the State Board of Elections. This happened in 2024, when former Republican BOE member Bruce Kemp missed the meeting where the early voting plan was approved and submitted his own proposal requesting to reduce early voting days below the 17 required, a dubious move when it came to state law. The State Board of Elections did not adopt his plan.
Reach journalist Brenna Flanagan at brenna@localdailymedia.com.
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