What is wrong with the Davidson County Election Commission?

Why no Early Voting in Bellevue?

Super Tuesday is March 6, 2012.  Early voting for Davidson County is February 15, 2012 through February 28, 2012, with early voting at Howard School for the complete February 15 - February 28 period and early voting at satellite locations from February 23 through February 28.

Unless Romney or Gingrich deliver a knock out punch in Florida then the Super Tuesday states, including Tennessee, will be extremely important. The Florida primary is a proportional primary where candidates split the delegates according to the percentage of votes they receive, so it is highly unlikely any candidate can deliver a Florida knock out punch. Therefore, the primary election will most likely be decided on Super Tuesday March 6. Which brings us back to the Davidson County Election Commission and early voting.

The election commission has established these early voting locations:

• Bordeaux Library, 4000 Clarksville Pk
• Edmondson Pk. Library, 5501 Edmondson Pk
• Green Hills Library, 3701 Benham Ave
• Hermitage Library, 3700 James Kay Ln
• Madison Library, 610 Gallatin Pk S.

What? What are they thinking?

I will try to establish a map pinpointing  these locations for these established early voting locations. For now,  imagine a map of Davidson County. What is wrong with this picture? Who will be voting in the Republican primary? Mostly Republicans. Right? What is a part of the county with large number of Republicans?  Bellevue and Belle Meade. But, the closest voting location for residents of the western end of the County, those folks living in populous Bellevue, is Green Hills. That is about 15 miles away.  Not many people are going to make a 30 mile round trip and navigate Green Hills traffic to early vote.  While there is also a Democratic County primary election on March 6th, the only races are Assessor of Property, Criminal Court Clerk, a General Sessions Judge, a Circuit Court Judge and the Democratic Executive Committee. None of these races will create much excitement and some of these offices may not even be contested. Turn out for the Davidson County Democratic primary will be extremely, extremely low. The real election on March 6th is the Republican Primary.

Why did the Election Commission not establish an early voting location in Bellview?  As established by law, the majority of members of the election commission at this time are Republicans. I do not think Republicans would be treated with any less consideration had we a Democratic majority election commission. Had we a Democrat majority election commission, I would think this choice of satellite voting locations was an intentional effort at voter suppression. What is the point of haveing a Republican dominated election commission if the Commission is going to treat Republican voters worse than would a Democrat dominated commission.


Looking again at the list of voter locations, I suspect that not a lot of people will be voting at the Bordeaux Library. I just don't think there are a lot of Republicans in Bordeaux. Why did the Election Commission not take a look at a map and put voting locations in areas most likely to have an interest in this election?  

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