COBB COUNTY: Ballot requests run into a glitch By <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>Kent A. Miles The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Saturday, November 22, 2008
http://www.ajc.com/printedition/content/printedition/days/index.html A Republican-generated effort to get out the vote for the Dec. 2 runoff election has hit a snag as thousands of requests for absentee ballots have been denied because the applications were not signed. County elections officials are contacting voters by mail, directing them to print applications from county or state election Web sites and fax them in by Wednesday. Many of the unsigned requests came in the form of cards printed by the Republican National Committee and mailed to voters. Republican U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss is in a tight battle to retain his seat by beating Democratic challenger Jim Martin. The signature line on the RNC cards is easy to miss since it appears after an entry asking voters to enter an address different from their permanent one. Georgia doesn't require voters to give a reason for voting by absentee ballot. Cobb County received about 7,075 of the cards from voters that were not signed, about 44 percent of the cards received. "We've never seen anything near that ratio," registration manager Beth Kish said. DeKalb County election officials have received 5,000 applications from the RNC mailing and rejected 2,800 of them. DeKalb is accepting applications that are unsigned on the signature line of the application if the voter wrote his or her name in cursive on the first line. Election officials in other counties report similar problems and have worked to notify voters. "We've now been hearing reports of our cards, and we're doing all we can to ensure that everyone who is eligible to vote gets the opportunity," said Ben Fry, executive director of the Georgia Republican Party. The state GOP distributed an e-mail Friday urging voters to sign the cards before mailing them. People who are unsure of the status of their absentee ballot application can check the secretary of state's Web site, www.sos.ga.gov/elections/polllocator. Staff writer Ty Tagami contributed to this article. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to Mark Crispin Miller's "News From Underground" newsgroup. To unsubscribe, send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] OR go to http://groups.google.com/group/newsfromunderground and click on the "Unsubscribe or change membership" link in the yellow bar at the top of the page, then click the "Unsubscribe" button on the next page. For more News From Underground, visit http://markcrispinmiller.com -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
