On Wednesday, November 3, 2004, at 11:59 AM, fmarkus wrote:
Why not use the GIS technology that the City has already paid for to make
life in the polling station a little easier on everyone concerned? And print
that 100-foot string statute in the chair judge manuals so we can all know
what we're doing.
Researching the confiscation of my campaign truck by Minneapolis Police yesterday I find that the election officials themselves had no problem with it. However, Republican Party officials complained voiciferously about it and MoveOn's locations also. Most of this occurred also after our polling place was visited by a lawyerish looking guy who drove up in a Mercedes SUV with North Dakota plates with a Bush sticker blocking his rearward vision. Suffice to say if he was here to vote he'd better get Minnesota plates real quick to at least to cover his tracks. The complaint itself is defective on at least a half dozen counts, and much of it is just plain unreadable- in fact it resembles the incomplete complaints given to disabled protestors who staged a sit in at the governors office a couple years ago. Those complaints were used to justify arresting the protesters to get them out of the office, then they were promptly released and the "charges" thrown out. It appears that neither the election judges or MPD bothered to ascertain the distance from the polling place to my campaign truck as I had before parking it. In fact, both independent election observers and party lawyers appear to have been camped out within the 100 foot radius of the polling place and were never moved. There was also a Bush campaign sign within 100 feet of the polling place that is still standing. If the election officials care to use the 100 feet from the property line argument, as Fred says, they need to know where the property line is. At the polling place in question, the property line(s) are not the sidewalk, and I suspect MPD would be quite surprised at where they are. MPD and the election judges also need to seriously reconsider if they want to strictly enforce the 100 foot from the public property line interpretation- they would thusly outlawing homeowners lawn signs on the near mile long periphery of some of our parks that contain polling places!
As well as confiscating my campaign vehicle, MPD was also witnessed yesterday chasing MoveOn volunteers from their chairs with flashing lights ablaze and last night cited a prominent local african-american athlete for exercising his right to free speech. So in conclusion, great job R.T. and Minneapolis, but isn't it time we got MPD under control?
from over 80% DFL 3-9,
Dyna Sluyter
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