Apr 24, 2024 2 min read

On Thursday, I attended an evening meeting of the Washington County Board of Commissioners regarding curing of votes in our county. It was standing room only. The meetings are normally held during the day when people work, making it hard for the public to participate.

The decision to not allow voters to “cure” mail-in ballots is a blatant attempt to disenfranchise both Democratic and Republican voters, along with voters who have a disability, are traveling, in the military, elderly, or are a poll worker, like I am. The majority of mail-in ballots come from Democratic voters. Nearly 4,000 votes have been mailed already. No one will be notified until after the election if their vote did not count. How is this a fair and free election?

When a voter comes to a polling place and makes a mistake and wants to vote for another party, we are allowed with the proper procedure to let the voter make a correction to their ballot so that their vote counts. Why will this not be allowed for mail-in voting?

Sadly we are still so divided.

Nick Sherman, the chairman of the commissioners, changed the order of the public comment period putting it at the end of the Thursday meeting. Commisioner Larry Maggi pointed out it was the first meeting where this had been done. Some people left due to this change. Numerous people who stayed spoke in opposition of the Republican commissioners’ vote the week before not allowing people to cure their ballots. Strategic?

All of Washington County’ commissioners took an oath to work for their constituents, not their own agendas. Since an overwhelming majority of residents are against the decision to not allow the curing of mail-in ballots, Maggi recommended an emergency meeting and new vote. Sherman said he would not change his vote, Janis replied, “We are not voting now.”

This is not working for the majority of the commissioners’ constituents.

Lois Bower-Bjornson

Scenery Hill