Seven Kenton County polling sites are still flagged for violations against the Americans with Disabilities Act, or ADA, said Kenton County Board of Elections Chair Gabe Summe at the Kenton County Board of Elections monthly meeting Thursday morning.
“We are doing what we can to comply,” Summe told the other board members.
Following a complaint from a citizen to the Department of Justice about the accessibility of polling locations in 2022, Kenton County entered into a consent decree with the Department of Justice to better survey and provide accommodations for the polling places in the county.
This entails surveys of voting sites for handicapped accessibility and mandates the county provide accommodations to help people with mobility issues get into polling places with tricky geography. These could include measures like adding temporary ramps, adding mats on uneven ground for wheelchairs, and changing entry points. The county signed the consent decree in January of last year, and it lasts for three years.
“This is going to be the third or fourth time for some of these surveys… They want a picture from here and then want a picture from here,” Summe said, describing the information she had to supply in order to complete the surveys. “And then they want to see the measuring stick. We were also not using the proper digital level for them. I’m just saying that’s the kind of detail in which these conversations get.”
Summe stated that the DOJ had not shared the identity of the person who made the complaint, saying the department reported the complaint was anonymous.
A representative from the DOJ did not attend the meeting.
Summe also told LINK nky after the meeting she was skeptical the complaint was, in fact, anonymous. At any rate, she said, “It was enough to trigger them to come and do their own review of all the spots.”
She added that the Board of Elections had yet to receive a local complaint about accessibility directly to the county office.
The DOJ surveys are contextualized by changes in the number of polling places over the past few election cycles. Most notably, the 2022 general election saw the county consolidate the number of polling places from the previous number of 47 to just 24. That consolidation along with other factors, such as an exceptionally long ballot, led to long lines and other logistical issues at polling sites. Several regional leaders, including the mayors of Covington and Erlanger, expressed frustration at the election conditions.
The number of polling places has increased since then–there were 38 in November–, but Summe has maintained that the DOJ surveys are among the reasons why she hasn’t been able to bring the number of polling sites back up to the 47 it was before the 2022 general.
“We’re being singled out,” said Kenton County Sheriff and Board of Elections Member Chuck Korzenborn. “We’re going to have to go to court and let them sue us.”
“I would not want that,” Summe told LINK nky after the meeting. This may entail pitching some of the sites the county can’t bring into compliance and doing what they can to keep the public informed.
“I have alternatives,” Summe said. “I’d rather go with the alternatives than try to make history.”
The county must submit a final voting plan to the state in April.
The next meeting of the Kenton County Board of Elections will take place on Feb. 5, 2024 at 8 a.m. at the Kenton County Government Center on Simon Kenton Way.