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Protests Over Fresno County's Plan to Eliminate Polling Places


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By: Ashley Ritchie

Outside the Fresno County Board of Supervisors meeting Tuesday, concerned voters with "Communities for a New California" rallied against what they're calling an injustice.

"There's going to be a real impact on the communities we care about the most," Alegria De La Cruz, with Communities for a New California, said.

Inside the supervisors meeting, Fresno County Clerk Victor Salazar tried to make the board understand the need to eliminate hundreds of polling places in the county, in order to save nearly $200,000.

"We've exhausted everything that we can. We reduced our staffing. In the last five budget cycles, we've lost a third of our staff. We're at our wits end," Salazar told the board.

Opponents argue the selection of which sites to eliminate has a direct impact on certain areas of town.

"We understand that is going to have a disproportionate impact on people of color, on people with disabilities who may have relied in the past on polling sites closer to their homes to get there or people who have limited transportation," De La Cruz said.

But Salazar says, when you look at the numbers, the decision adds up.

"In the June primary election, 72% of the ballots that were cast were by mail. So the bulk of voters do so by using the absentee ballot," he said.

"For some folks who may not read or feel so comfortable looking things over and filling them out on paper, they really want to be able to punch a hole in a ballot," De La Cruz said.

The board turned the issue over to elections officials, leaving the decision up to them hesitantly.

"I'm really questioning, two weeks prior to an election that we want to start changing polling locations. I think we're going to cause real disruption," Judith Case, Fresno County Supervisor said.

There has been talk of filing a lawsuit against the county on the basis that it's illegal to change the number of polling places between a primary and general election.

Salazar says it would cost more than $180,000 to re-instate all the polling places.

He proposed setting up voting centers the Saturday before the election at libraries across the county.

Doing that would cost about $76,000.

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