NC elections officials allow 13 counties impacted by Hurricane Helene to adjust voting locations
County elections boards must have a bipartisan majority vote to adjust early voting locations or Election Day precinct sites.
The North Carolina State Board of Elections voted unanimously on Monday to adopt a resolution allowing 13 counties impacted by Hurricane Helene to have more flexibility to administer the upcoming election and ensure voters have access to the ballot.
Under the eight-page resolution, Ashe, Avery, Buncombe, Haywood, Henderson, Madison, McDowell, Mitchell, Polk, Rutherford, Transylvania, Watauga and Yancey county elections boards can modify in-person early voting locations and Election Day precinct sites, provided they do so with a bipartisan majority vote.
The resolution also ensures counties can process an absentee ballot request from a voter or a voter’s near relative or verifiable legal guardian in person at the county board office. NCSBE Executive Director Karen Brinson Bell said on Monday that all 100 county boards of elections offices are now open throughout the state. At least 14 county offices in western North Carolina had previously been closed due to the hurricane.
Additionally, voters in the 13 impacted counties can hand-deliver their completed absentee ballot to another North Carolina county’s board of elections office or the State Board office so long as it is received by 7:30 pm on Election Day.
Stacy Eggers, a Republican member of the state elections board who lives in western North Carolina, said the resolution is needed to ensure voters have access to the ballot box.
“We will continue to make voting accessible to the voters,” Eggers said. “Whether we need four-wheelers, horses or helicopters, this disaster highlights the need for consistency in our work and making sure that we get to the locations that the voters expect us to be in. The proposal that we have before us is all about logistics.”
In-person early voting will begin in all of North Carolina’s counties on Oct. 17. Early voting ends at 3 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 2. A list of early voting sites, as of Monday, is available here. Voters can also search for an early voting site in their county here.
Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 5.
This is post is being made available for free to all readers to ensure they have access to reliable coverage of Hurricane Helene. If you want to support this kind of continued reporting, you can sign up for a paid Anderson Alerts membership here. But in lieu of a paid membership, I’d strongly encourage folks to support disaster relief efforts to the people of western North Carolina.