(no subject)

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

So, I don't have much to say on this other than to mention this and to see the reaction of people here.

I don't have a link or the exact specifics, but, I have on what I consider to be good authority the fact that:

There is an electoral district in/near Buffalo, NY (I don't know the exact spot, but the person who told me this, is in my view, a trustworthy person) where the polling place is a police station.

This seems kinda like voter intimidation and I consider it to be inappropriate to have a voting place to be at a police station. I'm sure there was a school or church nearby that could have sufficed. What do you think?

Comments

[vnsplshr.livejournal.com]

It's a government building.

Fits perfectly.

[mijopo.livejournal.com]

Can you say more about why you think it "seems kinda like voter intimidation" and/or why it's inappropriate?

[404.livejournal.com]

Oh good grief, I guess someone can always find something to complain about if they look hard enough.

[tridus.livejournal.com]

I think it doesn't matter in the slightest. If you can be deterred from voting because the vote is in a police station, you probably don't have a strong stake in the outcome.

(Of course I'm a white male bureaucrat, which is so boring to the police that I might as well be invisible.)

[harry-beast.livejournal.com]

The job of elected officials is to pass laws; therefore, if you consider law enforcement to be inappropriate, you probably shouldn't vote.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

I'm-a just say this: there's no reason to hold voting places in *churches* as *that* can be plenty capable in some people of intimidation in its own right.

[geezer-also.livejournal.com]

A church????? You can't vote in a church, what about the separation of church and state???? A polling place in a church indeed!!

[reality-hammer.livejournal.com]

Sounds like an urban legend since NY law requires a police officer to be on duty at all polling stations. (Thus making all polling places "a deterrent" to voting by that logic.)

You also need a lot of room and no problem with dozens of people moving in and out of a building without much checking and that doesn't fit well with a police station.

However, an annex and/or part of a government building which happens to also contain a police station (which you will often find in a small town) is both reasonable and shouldn't deter anyone.

IMO a church would be more objectionable.

In any case you can always use absentee ballots or cast your vote at county election offices if you have a problem with your local polling place.

[devil-ad-vocate.livejournal.com]

Not a problem.

[chron-job.livejournal.com]

Depends on context.

I could see it depressing minority voter turnout in areas where there's strong minority-law enforcement distrust... but if this isn't one of those places, its possibly a non-issue.

[thies.livejournal.com]

because there can't be made a case for intimidation/influence when one party up for election runs with strong ties to christianity and everyone has to cast their votes in a church, amirite?

[ghoststrider.livejournal.com]

I'd need more information and fact-checking, but yes, that is highly inappropriate, if only because the police could intimidate anyone into voting for pro-police union candidates just by looking at a voter.

Face it, the police are not honest and haven't been for decades. They have their own self-interests which are not subordinated to the public interest. And thus, having a polling station inside a police station is a definite conflict of interest there.