Tarrant County Commissioners Court votes to keep early voting sites on college campuses
FORT WORTH – The Tarrant County Commissioners Court reversed course Thursday, voting to approve 51 early voting sites in the county after voting down a similar proposal last week.
An overflow crowd attended a special meeting of the court, called by County Judge Tim O'Hare to resolve the issue after an initial list of 50 early voting sites failed to get approval at the September 4 court meeting.
An agenda ahead of Thursday's meeting included three options for lists of early voting sites. The first option removed polling locations at UT Arlington, the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and two Tarrant County College campuses. The county elections administrator said they were chosen for removal because they are within 1.5 miles of another early voting location and had lower turnout of the two. The other options kept some campus locations but eliminated others.
Early on in the meeting, Tarrant County elections administrator Clint Ludwig offered another possible list, which ended up passing. The list included 51 voting sites; the 50 on the list that failed last week, plus an additional site.
The vote passed 4-1, with only O'Hare opposed.
O'Hare, arguing in favor of removing early voting sites from some college campuses, said that a lower percentage of young people vote than other demographics, but a higher percentage of early voting locations were on college campuses. O'Hare said there were far fewer early voting locations at senior centers, even though a far higher percentage of seniors vote.
"Sixteen percent of early voting locations are on college campuses, whereas there are limited ones at senior centers. You wanted to talk about voter suppression, this is suppressing senior citizens," Judge O'Hare said in the meeting.
Dozens of people signed up ahead of the meeting to speak. Those who spoke in favor of removing early voting sites said that parking on campuses like UT Arlington is difficult, so it is not accessible for people outside of the college community. They also raised budgetary concerns.
"I skipped all my classes today to be here and I would have done it three dozen times over," one UTA student told CBS News Texas.
People who spoke against removing early voting sites from campuses said that faculty and staff vote at those sites, in addition to students. They also pointed out that many students lack access to transportation, making it more difficult to access alternative sites, even if they are less than a mile away.
"This is probably the most important election of our lifetime," Sen. Royce West told commissioners. "We need to have as many voting as possible."
O'Hare has been the target of criticism from students, some of whom called the effort to remove early voting sites from campuses a form of voter suppression.
County data from the 2020 presidential election shows that nearly 10% of people who voted early in Tarrant County cast their ballot at college campuses. Close to 10,000 of those voters used the polling station at UT Arlington.
Scheduling controversy
Part of the controversy surrounding the meeting was because the two Democrats on the Commissioner's Court are in Washington, D.C. for a conference. O'Hare, a Republican, knew in advance that the Democratic members were going to be traveling. The other two commissioners, Manny Ramirez and Gary Fickes, are also Republican.
At the beginning of the meeting, O'Hare said he had asked the county administrator to check with each of the commissioners on whether Thursday's meeting would work for them. He said Commissioner Roy Brooks did not object and that Commissioner Alisa Simmons did not respond.
Simmons, who joined the meeting virtually, could be seen shaking her head. O'Hare said that there was no restriction on commissioners casting their votes virtually.
Later on in the meeting, Brooks briefly joined Simmons. O'Hare assured them both that the court would not take a vote without them being available.
When it came time for the vote, both Simmons and Brooks appeared by video and were part of the majority.