Wayne prepares for election

Last day to register is October 6

By TOM KANE

HONESDALE, PA — Cindy Furman, director of the Wayne County Election Bureau, asked the commissioners for an extension of her bureau’s office hours six days before the deadline to register on Monday, October 6.

The office will be opened from 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. from September 29 to October 3. The commissioners also approved that the office will be opened on Saturday, October 4 from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 noon.

“We want to make it as easy as possible for people to register who might be working during the week or who might be on vacation,” Furman said.

On October 6, the last day to register, the office will be opened until 7:00 p.m., she said.

The county will also allow people in the military to register online and to vote online on November 7. “The members of the military in Iraq, for example, would normally have to mail their ballots, which can take a week or more, but voting online would be almost immediate,” Furman said.

She also announced that nine polling stations have been made handicapped accessible, with ramps and other kinds of assistance in order for disabled persons to gain entrance to a building.

“Out of the 37 polling sites, only seven will be inaccessible for someone in a wheelchair,” she said. “In those instances, people with handicaps can make use of a provisional ballot or an absentee ballot. Every means will be taken to allow the entire population to vote.”

People with disabilities will be able to vote using new electronic voting machines, one for each polling place, she said. Her bureau has printed and will circulate 35,000 fliers that explain how to vote on the old all-paper ballot system, as well as the electronic machines.

Inmates at the new county correction facility will be able to register and vote by email, she said. “Certain types of felons are not able to vote, but the rest of the prison population will be able,” she said.

For more information call the bureau at 570/253-5970.