What council redistricting is doing for voters

Late local election changes for your inconvenience:

Davidson County Election Commission

Updates Voter Database for Redistricting

At 1:00 pm today, July 1, 2011, the new Metropolitan Council districts and School Board districts were uploaded into the Election Commission’s computerized database of registered voters in Davidson County. This comes after weeks of preparation involving staff from the Election Commission, Planning and IT Departments. This step will allow the Election Commission to proceed with the following:

1. New voter registration cards will be printed and mailed by July 11. Voters will receive them before the beginning of Early Voting. Any voter whose Council District, precinct or polling location changed will receive a new voter registration card. This will affect approximately 30% of the registered voters in Davidson County.
   
   
2. Voter lists and street guides sorted by precinct will now be available for candidates.
   
   
3. The “Find Where I Vote” function on the Election Commission website will be restored on Saturday July 2, 2011 and will reflect the new districts and precincts.

Albert Tieche
Administrator of Elections

If you have a computer, you've got a head start on those who don't. Have faith in Metro IT, voters. You can find out tomorrow where you vote if you go to a Metro website. Those who can't afford access are just out of luck. They'll have to consult their snail-mail box after July 11.

Redistricting is supposed to afford better representation, but the short timeline for re-registration of 30% of voters seems more like disenfranchisement. We're in the middle of a holiday and preoccupied by summer diversions, for Pete's sake. Whichever candidates benefit from a depressed voter turnout have to love this news release.