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Plan to reduce Mahoning County voting precincts postponed to 2015
YOUNGSTOWN
Mahoning County Board of Elections officials will postpone a plan — discussed since early 2013 — to reduce the number of voting precincts by the Nov. 4 general election.
Instead, the board will wait until early next year to cut about 50 of its 273 precincts in time for the May 2015 primary, said Director Joyce Kale-Pesta.
The delay was caused by Youngs-town’s ward-redistricting issues, said Kale-Pesta and board Vice Chairman David Betras.
About 20 of the precincts to be cut are in Youngstown, Kale-Pesta said.
After a year of on-again, off-again discussions, Youngstown City Council has an agreement in place on a ward-redistricting plan and is expected to vote on it — put together with a lot of assistance from the board of elections — sometime this month.
But that doesn’t give the board of elections enough time to put together its plan to reduce voting precincts in the county, Kale-Pesta said.
Another reason for concern is a possible charter amendment on the Nov. 4 ballot to reduce the number of wards in Youngstown from seven to five, she said.
“I’m up against the wall if the charter amendment is approved and” the board had already cut precincts, Kale-Pesta said. “We’d have to do it again if that passes.”
Youngstown is supposed to redistrict after every 10-year U.S. census, but hasn’t done so for more than 30 years.
The population in the wards ranges from 7,227 to 12,130, using 2010 census numbers.
The proposed new map would have the wards’ population range from 8,949 to 9,534 and wouldn’t count the 2,071 prisoners at the Northeast Ohio Correctional Center on the East Side. About 75 percent of the private prison’s population are illegal immigrants convicted of federal felonies.
After a countywide voting-precinct reduction is done, the board must send a letter to each registered voter informing them of their polling location, which costs about $60,000, Kale-Pesta said.
The board’s original plan was to have the precinct reduction, including the elimination of 20 of Youngstown’s 77 precincts, done by mid-June.
Each precinct reduced saves the county about $1,200 to $1,500 per election.
Besides Youngstown, most of the other precincts cut would be in Struthers, Campbell, Boardman, Austintown and Poland Township.
The board would try to consolidate as many precincts as possible into the same polling locations.
Among the state’s 13 most-populous counties, Mahoning has the lowest average number of voters per precinct at about 620. The statewide average is about 825 per precinct.
The board reduced the number of precincts from 416 to 312 in 2001. Since then, small cuts were made in 2006 and 2012, bringing the number of precincts to 273.