Jul 29, 2015 6 min read

As mass shootings continue to make headlines, they resonate in, perhaps, an unexpected way: how to use schools as polling places while, at the same time, keeping children safe.

In the vast number of attacks in schools over the past 20 years, the assailant was a member of the student body. But the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in Newtown, Conn., where 20-year-old Adam Lanza killed 20 children, six adults and himself in December 2012, raised concerns about “outsiders” causing mayhem.

“Fourteen precincts, about eight percent of our total polling places, use schools,” said Wes Parry III, Washington County assistant director of elections.

Canon-McMillan School District, which, with five voting venues, has the most polling places of any district in the county, asked the elections office to make other arrangements if possible.

Canon-McMillan Superintendent Michael Daniels said Tuesday it wasn’t only school security that raised concern, it was also lack of parking. During a teachers’ in-service day, students won’t be attending classes but sporting events or other activities can take place at the buildings.

This might mean a longer walk for voters going to the polls because a limited number of parking spaces are in demand.

“Voters complain they have to walk too far to get to polls because of parking,” Daniels said. “It’s a common problem with most of our schools. Not enough parking is available. It’s more like a convenience to the voters. Certainly, if they select our school, we’ll do our best to accommodate them.”

The district sent its message to the elections office as the board was setting the calendar for the school year. Elections generally take place the third Tuesday in May and the first Tuesday in November. The exceptions are presidential primary years, which are held the fourth Tuesday in April, and years when the first Tuesday in November coincides with Nov. 1. Election day is then bumped to Nov. 8.

The school district’s inquiry comes at a time when more polling places are needed in Canon-McMillan School District. North Strabane grew by 33.3 percent from 2000 to 2010, years in which the U.S. Census was conducted, while Cecil Township experienced 15.5 percent growth.

Because of population growth in the Canon-McMillan School District, the elections office foresees the need to expand the number of places Cecil and North Strabane residents can cast ballots so that voters don’t end up standing in endless lines.

“North Strabane right now has six precincts and it probably needs to be nine,” Parry said. “Cecil Township has six and it probably needs to be eight. “Changing now is not smart. Growth in North Strabane is in residential housing complexes that don’t come with any community center.”

North Strabane Township has six voting precincts, and four of them exceed the 1,200 voters that the state Election Code sets as a maximum. Two have double the number of voters, and one is nearly double, Parry said. Any proposed changes to voting precincts must be approved by Washington County Court.

Parry said he spoke with a Canon-McMillan administrator about the matter. By law, town halls and schools, built and maintained by taxpayer dollars, do not charge the county for use of their facilities as polling places, so replacing schools with privately owned voting venues has the potential to cost more.

Dr. Karen Polkabla is superintendent of the Ringgold School District, which has the second-highest number of Washington County voting precincts in school buildings.

Ringgold has adjusted its school calendar so there are no classes on election days.

“One is in-service and the other is for parent-teacher conferences,” Polkabla said Monday. “We try our best to do that.”

At Ringgold High School, voting is conducted in a portable classroom. Construction at the Ringgold North Elementary School in Gastonville is likely to constrict parking, “so it’s probably not feasible to have voting there this year,” she said.

Burgettstown High School was a polling place eight years ago, but this activity ceased due to renovations. Elections Director Larry Spahr said when construction was complete, the elections office was told voting could not resume due to space limitations. The polling place for Smith Township’s 3rd precinct was moved to the Burgettstown Kids Center.

Wanda Murren, spokeswoman for the Pennsylvania Department of State, which oversees election-related matters, pointed out that state law reads, “In selecting polling places, the county board of elections shall, wherever possible and practicable, select schoolhouses, municipal buildings or rooms, or other public buildings for that purpose. Any board of public education or school directors, or county or the municipal authorities shall, upon request of the county board, make arrangements for the use of school property, or of county or municipal property for polling places.”

“The relevant word in the statute is ‘shall,'” Murren said, “which means ‘a duty.'”

Although the Election Code was written in 1937, “It’s the still the law,” Parry said. “Believe me, I would love the Legislature to address a lot of things that are seemingly outdated in the Election Code. Unless the Legislature amends or until some court precedent changes it, that is the law.”

According to the Presidential Commission on Election Administration, about a quarter of voters nationwide voted in schools in the 2008 and 2012 elections. Along with Pennsylvania, Georgia and Michigan and “have the strongest statutory language encouraging the use of schoolhouses as polling places.” Schools are likely to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act, so they are accessible to both students and voters.

Colorado, the state where the Columbine High School mass shooting occurred in 1999, uses an almost all-mail ballot system but also provides for in-person voting and ballot drop-off at a number of designated locations. It has avoided using schools for security reasons and because of the length of its ballot drop-off period, which is at least 15 days before a general election, or at least eight days for other elections.

The commission acknowledged that because of tragic shootings at schools across the country, security is a real concern when designating schools as polling places. To address this problem, it recommended that during elections, students have an ‘in-service day,’ taking them off the premises.