Voting from home

  • By KAYLEE OSOWSKI
  • Thursday, May 15, 2014 10:15pm
  • News

This year’s October election could see more Kenai Peninsula Borough residents casting votes from their kitchen tables.

An ordinance requiring borough elections be held by mail is up for introduction at Tuesday’s assembly meeting.

Assembly member Bill Smith sponsored the ordinance, which proposes that instating vote-by-mail precincts borough-wide would be more efficient, convenient, save money and could increase voter turn out.

“We’re hoping that we’ll get some good results if we go to vote by mail and make it easier for people and have better voter turn out,” Smith said.

The ordinance calls for ballots to be mailed to each registered voter in the precinct 15 days before the election. Ballots must be postmarked on or before midnight of Election Day and received by the following Tuesday. Return envelopes addressed to the borough clerk’s office will be provided. The ordinance also allows for ballots to be deposited at a designated deposit site.

If the assembly passes the ordinance as is, precinct polling places would be eliminated. However, voters would still be able to vote in person at absentee voting sites.

Absentee voters can apply and vote in person at the borough clerk’s office at the George A. Navarre Administration Building in Soldotna, the Kenai Peninsula Borough Annex office in Homer or the nearest city clerk’s office beginning 15 days before Election Day.

Of the 28 precincts within the borough, six are absentee-by-mail only and four of those have absentee voting stations on Election Day.

Current absentee-by-mail return envelopes have prepaid postage.

Smith said the borough hires more than 120 election workers and changing over to vote-by-mail would reduce that number. However, to send out ballots by mail, costs would increase for additional printing and postage.

Borough Clerk Johnie Blankenship said she is working to determine what the cost difference would be to change to a vote-by-mail election. She hopes to have a fiscal note available for the public hearing on the ordinance.

In addition, the ordinance looks to repeal publishing statements supporting or opposing propositions in the informational election brochure. Smith said the seven-year section of code allowing for the statements has been an issue in the past when only one side of an issue submits its position. He said this creates an “impossible balancing act” for the clerk.

“I don’t see that it’s much of a loss or any loss to the public discussion because of the potential for abuse,” he said.

He said discussion about separating the two halves of the ordinance did take place, but because they are part of the same topic and section of code, they were combined. Assembly can amend the ordinance to separate either section of the ordinance. If the assembly passes the ordinance, it would be in effect upon enactment and would be in place for the Oct. 7 borough election.

The ordinance is scheduled for a public hearing at the assembly meeting at 6 p.m. on June 17 at the George A. Navarre Administration Building in Soldotna.

Kaylee Osowski can be reached at kaylee.osowski@peninsulaclarion.com

More in News

(City of Seward)
Police standoff closes Seward Highway

Police say standoff was with ‘barricaded individual,’ not escaped inmate

Mount Redoubt can be seen across Cook Inlet from North Kenai Beach on Thursday, July 2, 2022. (Photo by Erin Thompson/Peninsula Clarion)
Alaska not included in feds’ proposed 5-year oil and gas program

The plan includes a historically low number of proposed sales

A copy of "People, Paths, and Places: The Frontier History of Moose Pass, Alaska" stands in sunlight in Soldotna, Alaska, on Friday, Sept. 29, 2023. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Moose Pass to receive award for community historical effort

“People, Paths, and Places: The Frontier History of Moose Pass, Alaska” was a collaboration among community members

Kenai Peninsula Borough School District Board Member Debbie Cary speaks during a meeting of the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly on Tuesday, April 5, 2022, in Soldotna, Alaska. Cary also served on the borough’s reapportionment board. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)
School board president receives award for meritorious service

Debbie Cary, of Ninilchik, is the Alaska Superintendent Association’s 2024 recipient of the Don MacKinnon Excellence in Education Award

Dr. Tara Riemer is seen in this provided photo. (Photo courtesy Alaska SeaLife Center)
SeaLife Center president resigns

Riemer worked with the center for 20 years

Voters fill out their ballots at the Challenger Learning Center in Kenai, Alaska, on Election Day, Nov. 8, 2022. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Election 2023: When, where to vote Tuesday

City council, Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly, the local school board races are all on the ballot

Dianne MacRae, Debbie Cary, Beverley Romanin and Kelley Cizek participate in a Kenai Peninsula Borough School District Board of Education candidate forum at Soldotna Public Library in Soldotna, Alaska, on Thursday, Sept. 28, 2023. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
School board candidates wrap up forum series

The forum was the eighth in a series hosted by the Clarion and KDLL ahead of the 2023 elections

Signs direct visitors at the City of Seward’s city hall annex on Sunday, Nov. 28, 2021, in Seward, Alaska. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)
Electric sale referendums to be reconsidered next month

The two referendums aim to remove from the city’s Oct. 3 ballot two propositions related to the sale of the city’s electric utility

Sockeye salmon caught in a set gillnet are dragged up onto the beach at a test site for selective harvest setnet gear in Kenai, Alaska, on Tuesday, July 25, 2023. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Board of Fish proposals center on king salmon, east side setnet fishery

Many proposals describe changes to the Kenai River Late-Run King Salmon Management Plan

Most Read