Legislatively Speaking
By Senator Lena C. Taylor
Lena C. Taylor
In the Spring 2020 election, many Milwaukee voters went to their polling locations to find nearly 97% of them closed. For those lucky enough to see a news broadcast, hear it from a friend, or possibly visit the Election Commission website, they learned that Milwaukee had reduced their usual 180 polling locations down to just five sites.
It was the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and we were under a state of emergency. According to a Milwaukee County website, at the time, 112 Wisconsinites had died from COVID-19 or related causes. Milwaukee County was hit particularly hard and suffered 68 of those deaths.
Some 1200 confirmed cases were in the city. We were in unchartered territory. In the midst of the crisis, there were mistakes and missteps made. Particularly, when it came to the elections of that year.
The COVID-19 pandemic exposed inconsistencies in our procedures across municipalities. Questions regarding polling locations, not the usual who, what, when, where, and why, arose across the state. Who has the authority to close a polling location? What number of polling sites can be closed or impacted? When and how must you notify voters about closing a polling location? Where can you relocate a polling location? Why do you need to close or change a polling location? Oftentimes, the answers to these questions centered around safety.
Historically, Wisconsin elections are some of the safest and most secure in the country. The idea of safe has traditionally been tied to election fraud, not one’s physical health. As legislators, we’ve been forced to rethink the spectrum of safety and make improvements in how we administer our elections.
This week, I joined forces with a group of bi-partisan legislators and community stakeholders, to introduce a package of election bills. The goals of the proposed legislation are to bring uniformity to a number of election practices, protect election workers, ensure a minimum number of polling locations, and close loopholes in military voting. The bills also propose changes at the Wisconsin Elections Commission to include the ability of local governments to ask for reimbursements for the costs of special elections.
These reforms are a start. They are a first step to guarantee that no matter what part of the state you vote in, the treatment, access and ability to participate fairly in elections, will be the same. We can never again see a time when voters show up to their regular polling locations, only to find the doors locked and no real information on where they should go to cast a ballot.
We need to root out all forms of voter suppression, whether deliberate or unintentional. There had to be a response to the concerns raised by Wisconsin residents, who felt marginalized in the 2020 electoral process. I remember the frustrated and angry residents, who waited in line for hours to vote. I promised not to forget the number of people who were turned away at polling locations and redirected across town. I carry with me the defeated voters, who threw their hands up in frustration, when they realized that because of election problems, that were no fault of their own, they would miss the opportunity to vote. I am making a down-payment on my promise to fix what happened to them.