The ballot drop box on Fifth Avenue outside the Linn County Courthouse is available 24 hours a day.
We voters in Albany and the rest of Oregon may be shaking our heads about the fear-mongering in the press about the mail and the general election in the fall.
The Postal Service reportedly wrote to several states warning them about a risk in voting by mail. The risk is that if voters don’t get their blank ballots in time or mail them back too late, they may not be delivered in time to be counted.
Oregon’s chief elections official, Secretary of State Bev Clarno, got a letter from the Postal Service too. It said there should not be a problem in Oregon as long as counties mail blank ballots at least two weeks before the Nov. 3 election day, as the law requires.
The Postal Service says that transit times can’t be guaranteed, but most domestic first-class mail is delivered two to five days after it’s received by the post office. And to make sure, voters should mail completed ballots at least a week before election day, no later than Tuesday, Oct. 27.
None of this is new. What’s the big deal?
The post office does a good job. It usually delivers letters within two days, not five, and this good performance has been seemingly unaffected by the corona crisis.
So Oregon won’t have a problem. And in states where elections by mail are a novelty, brought on by Covid-related safety concerns, there’s a simple solution once the blank ballots are sent out. The solution is to set up ballot drop boxes the way Oregon has done so voters don’t have to rely on the mail to send their ballots back.
Come to think of it, why did the Oregon legislature think it necessary for the state to bear the mailing cost of returning ballots? It could have just told us to drop our ballot envelopes — no stamp necessary — into the nearest box.
There are 14 of those boxes in Linn County towns. Three, at the courthouse in Albany and at the Lebanon and Sweet Home police stations, are available 24 hours. The others are in city halls, mostly.
Benton County has 10 drop sites available around the clock, including one at the North Albany Shopping Center, and seven more inside buildings such as libraries and stores.
If they’re worried about getting ballots back in time, every state in the country can set up drop sites the way Oregon has done. Then they can quit worrying about how long it takes to mail ballots back. (hh)
The easier it is to vote, the better for everyone.
I agree, each state should make voting easy. Personally, I like mail-in and absentee voting.
Just be sure and require proof of residency, signature verification, and verified voter registration. This would reduce a large percentage of fraudulent voting.
But not every state has these requirements and hence the risk.
And I didn’t even bring up the issues with the USPS, drop boxes, and corrupt election officials. But I’m willing to bury my head in the sand given these are probably small problems.
Democrats have made plain that they need to win “By any means necessary”
That makes conservatives naturally distrustful of changes at this late date. Changes – by the way – That are being promoted primarily by Dems…and lets not forget how they rigged their very own primary in 2016. We’re acclimated to vote by mail here in Oregon but don’t wish to see it spread nationwide.
Drop boxes are convenient, but let’s not bury our heads in the sand.
Worries over “mail-in” election fraud are justified, especially in big states. Drop boxes are a tool for dishonest groups and people.
The AP, that fear mongering news organization, wrote an interesting article on the topic headlined, “Uncounted Oregon votes expose election vulnerability.”
https://apnews.com/555282eacee64bd493ef909fdaa8abd7
For Linn County, Drop Box locations can easily be found online.
http://www.co.linn.or.us/elections/
Scroll down, click on the hyper link then enter your address.
Great reporting, Hasso – I sent the idea into CNN – I’m sure the word is out to set up Ballot Boxes all over the place – we will vote, and we will be heard! We truly are in it to win it!
Drop boxes are a part solution. They won’t work for millions. Drop boxes are only a temporary fix for a country that has a perfectly functional postal system that is being destroyed by the president. What you are doing with this article is whitewashing the bigger picture. Thanks anyways.
Agree!!!
Glad to hear that you haven’t noticed a difference in the delivery of mail. We went from getting mail 6 days a week to getting a stack of mail two days a week. Delivery time went from 2 days to 2-7 days. Maybe the system in Albany was running better prior to the mandates of no overtime and not route helping, but the quality and service from the Post Office has been noticeably worse the past month+. It’s a huge topic of conversation on the neighborhood page.
And yes, ballot drop boxes are great. Vote!!!
https://sign.moveon.org/petitions/board-of-governors-of-the-united-states-postal-service-remove-louis-dejoy?
The solution is, drop boxes. I would like to see vote by mail nation wide. I walk or drive to the drop box and place my vote. We have a pandemic, we have elderly, we have hardships created by our leaders to surpress the vote! The solution is simple.
Oregon state and local leaders are creating hardships and suppressing the vote? That’s a news flash. Perhaps Hasso should look into that.
In case you didn’t get the memo, states and localities run the elections.
There is no “national election system” or “national vote by mail” law. So the suppression you rant about is happening pretty close to home.
GS
Point of order
Back when Oregon began voting at home, we could not do that for Federal ballots without approval. The same fraud/security/rigging tropes were proven empty by performance. Oregon got approval to proceed.
A significant reason for duplicating our process in other jurisdictions is to reduce exposure to the virus. That’s inconvenient to one political faction. They have come to believe that the process give their opposition advantage.
IHMO, fiddling with the US Post Service could be equated with rigging
The chair is in doubt on the member’s point.
“Approval” from the feds? Please, show us evidence of this “approval” and where it came from.
Here is a history of Oregon’s vote-by-mail. The SoS mentions nothing about “approval” from the feds.
https://sos.oregon.gov/elections/Documents/statistics/vote-by-mail-timeline.pdf
Not even the information bible (Wikipedia) favored by progressives mentions “approval” by the feds. It does say that vote-by-mail was established with Ballot Measure 60, a citizen’s initiative, in 1998.
Imagine that. Citizens used the initiative process (direct democracy) to “approve” something representative democracy couldn’t deliver.
Ray K must be mad as hell over this.
GS
So wound in your web that you missed a simple point.
State and local elections are state and local matters.
Federal elections are Federal matters. Oregon did not have authorization to conduct mailin for Federal elections until after a proof run at State level.
In my day, “years ago”, voting was an “event”. You got time off from work, or took off from home, or whatever but you went to a polling place & voted. So what’s wrong with that?? Be it an office, church, school building, even a “store front” it was VOTING. With Gov Katie now gonna pay postage on mail in votes that seems a bit “rigged” to me. Mail in votes are way too convenient and soooo subject to the potential of fraud.
I have spoken to several USPS employees and things are changing. Blue mail drop boxes are disappearing and so is their internal equipment. We are not getting our mail on a daily basis as we did before. I’m actually concerned for those people who rely on the USPS to get their medications delivered on time.
My Dear Brigitte, Here in red neck Albany we get every day delivery, except Sunday, by the Postal guys/girls. Not sure where you live? It is still the BEST manner of communicating. You probably haven’t been in a war zone ( ‘Nam 67-68) when a letter from home meant a great deal. Hey..my creditors don’t miss a day!
Yea vote by mail right. Funny thing is after speaking to folks about the last school bond up for vote in Albany – everyone I know was against it. Voting by mail just does not inspire confidence, quite the opposite.
“””… after speaking to folks about the last school bond up for vote in Albany – everyone I know was against it.”””
Can you really tell me with a straight face that — the people you know or spoke with — are a fair, random sample of Albany voters?
Only net taxpayers should have the franchise, and a filed tax return shown as evidence for registration (that is my second choice on the topic of voting).
Sounds absolutely reasonable!
What’s your first choice?
Consumer Sovereignty.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dollar_voting
Hmmmm….In essence you’re saying only those with skin in the game should have a say on how the game is played. Sounds reasonable.
hah hah all
…looking at the breaking news on my little telly tonight…
“USPS warns 46 states their voters could be DISENFRANCHISED by delayed mail-in votes.”
Have we come to this. I guess we have. So it goes.
The cure is vote and cast that little ballot in the DROP Box as soon as you get it.
Skip the mail in & give 45 the finger.
VOTE Peeps! VOTE!
Let’s get thru the pandemic, and move that ‘Man Without A Soul’ out of the arena, and just maybe, things may get better! We KNOW how to do these 2 things…..
Your lips to GOD’s ears.
maga2020.com