© 2024 Ideastream Public Media

1375 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio 44115
(216) 916-6100 | (877) 399-3307

WKSU is a public media service licensed to Kent State University and operated by Ideastream Public Media.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Group Calls for Extended Voting Hours and Other Voting Reforms

photo of Mike Brickner
ANDY CHOW
/
OPR
Mike Brickner wants to increase opportunities for people to cast ballots.

A coalition of voting rights groups says reforms are needed to the state’s election process to encourage voting and eliminate problems that keep voters from being able to cast ballots. 

A court order mandating weeknight and weekend voting hours statewide will expire next year.

Mike Brickner is working with the group All Voting is Local - which is urging the next Secretary of State to make those extended hours permanent. And that’s not all.

“Removing the prohibition against having only one voting site per county in the state of Ohio. Also instituting changes like having a permanent absentee voting list,” Brickner said.

In a written statement, a spokesman for current Secretary of State Jon Husted says improvements to voter registration and early and absentee voting processes have greatly enhanced the state’s score on a national election performance index. But the voting groups point out Ohio ranks behind 20 other states in that index.

Jo Ingles is a professional journalist who covers politics and Ohio government for the Ohio Public Radio and Television for the Ohio Public Radio and Television Statehouse News Bureau. She reports on issues of importance to Ohioans including education, legislation, politics, and life and death issues such as capital punishment. Jo started her career in Louisville, Kentucky in the mid 80’s when she helped produce a televised presidential debate for ABC News, worked for a creative services company and served as a general assignment report for a commercial radio station. In 1989, she returned back to her native Ohio to work at the WOSU Stations in Columbus where she began a long resume in public radio.