District voting error in Athens caught ahead of Tuesday election

The mistake has reportedly been corrected without incident, but nearly 70 registered voters in Athens-Clarke County Commission District 2, where a Tuesday nonpartisan election will decide the occupant of the seat for four years beginning in January, were at one point erroneously assigned to Athens-Clarke County Commission District 5, where no election is slated for Tuesday.

Vying for the District 2 seat are incumbent Melissa Link, a progressive firebrand with interests in affordable housing and historic preservation, and downtown Athens business owner Jason Jacobs, a political newcomer running on a platform of bridging differences between the community’s progressive ranks and citizens with other viewpoints.

The 66 affected voters, at addresses between 147 Oglethorpe Avenue and 545 Oglethorpe Avenue -- between Prince Avenue and Holman Avenue -- are being notified of the erroneous district assignment in a door-to-door effort by county elections office staff members. District 2, in central Athens-Clarke County, and District 5, immediately to the west and north of District 2, share a boundary along part of Oglethorpe Avenue.

According to a Friday news release from the county, as of that time, “no voter in this stretch of Oglethorpe Avenue addresses had cast an incorrect in-person or absentee ballot.”

The error was first noted on May 13, when an early voter alerted poll workers that the District 2 race, which should have appeared on their ballot, was not there. Two days later, a second voter noted the same mistake and alerted poll workers.

In both instances, the voters were issued ballots that included the District 2 contest, according to the county’s news release. Subsequent research by elections workers revealed no incorrect ballots had been cast in the District 2 race, according to the news release. The erroneous commission district assignments, which were corrected on May 16, can be traced to changes last year in voting precinct boundaries and polling places.

Voting precinct boundaries, which determine the polling place to which a voter should go to cast a ballot, are not the same as commission district boundaries. In fact, depending on their home address, voters in any given voting precinct can be casting ballots for offices in different political boundaries on election day.

Changes in polling places are relatively routine, and can become necessary if a particular polling place is no longer made available to the county.

“During the process of updating the information about the Oglethorpe Avenue addresses for Precinct 5C at Johnnie Lay Burks Elementary School,” the county explained in its news release, “the commission district was mistakenly changed from Commission District 2 to Commission District 5.”

Anyone residing anywhere in Athens-Clarke County who wants to be sure they are voting a correct ballot on Tuesday can go to the My Voter Page on the Georgia Secretary of State’s website, mvp.sos.ga.gov/, to get a complete look in advance at the ballot they should be issued at their polling place.