I’m about to talk about two things here: being sure you’re registered to vote, and actually really going to vote. Ready? Okay.
I know you think you are registered to vote. Saline County Clerk Doug Curtis just posted on his social media today that there are currently 73,215 registered voters in the county.
…But is your registration updated?
Did you move? Did you get married and change your name? Did you get mistaken for a felon and get your name taken off the registration list? Yes, I’m serious. Ok, if any of these things may possibly apply – or if they don’t – you should take a look at www.voterview.org. This is a page that lets you type in your name and birthdate, and then it shows the registration that you currently have on file at the Secretary of State’s office.
- If you aren’t registered to vote by 30 days before the election, you can’t vote.
- If your address is wrong, then you will end up unable to vote for some candidates in your current ward or district or precinct.
- If your name is wrong, you may not be able to vote either.
So get it fixed! I just moved and so I called the Saline County Clerk’s office. It was super easy and only took 5 minutes to update them with my new address and it showed up on the www.voterview.org website right away. Go to www.voterview.org to check, then call the County Clerk at 501-303-5630 if you need to change!
…Did you do those things?
Now let’s talk about the actual voting. Did you know that in Presidential Elections for Saline County it’s typical for nearly 30% of voters to stay home? And for Non-Presidential Election Years it’s even worse. About 45% of registered voters don’t vote in those years – the years we elect our City Mayors! Even more pitiful is, who knows how many just didn’t even register? Here comes numbers:
Saline County Voter Participation Percentage in Previous General Elections
- 2008 – 71.06% voted
- 2010 – 56.58 voted
- 2012 – 71.32 voted
- 2014 – 57.55 voted
Pitiful. Is this you, complaining on the Internet about our elected officials, when you didn’t even bother to vote or even register to vote? Don’t be that person.
You can Absentee vote, you can Early Vote and you have 12 hours on Election Day itself. Now that you’re done studying on whether you’re registered, take a minute after October 8th, 2016 (the 30-day mark) to figure out what days, times and places you can go to do your Americanly thing. Here’s where voting info will show up: http://www.elecprep.net/voting/ele_notices/
Are you an American or an American’t?! Get registered and go vote.