February 6, 2008
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Disenfranchised
The PDF on the NY State Board of Elections had an incorrect mailing address for New York City residents to send the thing back in to. This means that both times I tried to send it, they did not get it. This means that my registration did not process. This means no NY State primary voting for me and the thousands of other New Yorkers who attempted to register this way.
To be fair, the address listed on the form (32 Broadway, 7th fl, NY, NY, 10004) is a NY board of Election office, but the office that the registrations are to be sent to is:
200 Varick St
10th Fl
NY, NY, 10014.Supposedly, the 32 Broadway office is supposed to forward anything on to 200 Varick, but this obviously had not been happening. Shaun also had issues and the only reason that he got his voter registration card was because when he called to say he did not receive his card the first time, the person who he spoke to offered to mail him a registration form. They did and it had a pre-addressed label on the envelope to send the back in. However, when I called the first time, the only assistance I was offered was “try again.”I did. And still nothing.
I found all this out because on Monday, when I realized I had yet to get my voter registration card, I just thought I’d call to check in. Again. I was sure that my name was on their list and my actual card was just lost in the mail. When I discovered that they did not get my registration yet again, I double checked that the address printed on the PDF form was correct. This is how I learned that it was not.
“Ooops,” the office manager said.
After getting off the phone with him, I called my city councilmen. I called/emailed the New York Times. I called/emailed the News Desks of our local TV news people. On NPR’s Morning Edition today, there was a small mention about NY voters who registered but whose names were not on the list at the polling site. Nothing more. I don’t think so, anyway. I don’t have a TV, so I’m not sure if anything got on there.
Disenfranchisement of a vast city population aside, it really pisses me off that I took the time to be organized about my political involvement in the midst of a very difficult move from across an ocean to a very difficult city where I knew no one, had barely enough money to survive, undertook a massive job hunt, and started a new job. Living here is just so retardedly, unnecessarily hard sometimes. Things are lost here. Slipping through the cracks is easy.
Comments (2)
Please accept my apologies on behalf of the entire state of New York. Scary – this sure shakes me out of my “it can’t happen here” attitude.
Wow. They cannot deny that fault. Bungholes.
You checked more times than most people too.
Sorry about the disenfranchisement. For someone who goes to lengths to be careful, it really chaps that such a crack exists. I had not heard of it until now.
Still, Ohio has some jackbackward voting too. I believe they screwed up two presidential elections and still have yet to fix the problems. When we vote it feels very much like the bird on the Flintstones tapping out a letter.