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| Home Front: Politix |
| Lubbock Scrambles to Find 269 Spanish-speaking Election Clerks |
| 2004-07-24 |
| This is just great, with a little over 3 months to go. Increased federal scrutiny of the electoral process in the upcoming presidential election has Lubbock County officials scrambling to find up to 269 Spanish-speaking election clerks by November. Elections Administrator Dorothy Kennedy was notified Thursday of the new bilingual clerk requirements in a memo from Texas Sec retary of State Geoffrey Con nor. Training and staffing that number of election workers could cost as much as $27,000. However, County Commis sioner James Kitten said he was less worried about the cost and more worried about the county's ability to find that many election workers before November. "Over the past few years, getting workers has been difficult to start with," he said. "That's the big issue. You can't really have an election without workers." Although Texas has required bilingual election materials and bilingual clerks for nearly 30 years, the state never specified how many bilingual clerks should be in each precinct, according to a copy of Connor's memo obtained by The Ava lanche-Journal. The memo, which was sent to election administrators in every Texas county, recommended at least one bilingual clerk for each voting precinct in which voters with Spanish surnames constitute at least 5 percent of the population. According to the state's formula, Lubbock County must assign three bilingual clerks to 19 precincts, two bilingual clerks to 22 precincts and one bilingual clerk to another 22 precincts. Kennedy will assign the remaining 146 workers to "take care of the other precincts that don't hit the 5 percent threshold," she said. Connor's urgency stemmed from the U.S. Department of Justice's decision to spotlight Texas' compliance with bilingual election requirements, according to the memo. "In light of the controversy surrounding the 2000 presidential election, the 2004 general election will be examined very closely," Connor wrote. "DOJ has given us advance notice that bilingual election clerks will be one of the election issues that they will be monitoring closely." According to Kennedy, federal officials might be assigned to observe the vote in Lubbock County. One complaint raised during the 2000 election was the lack of Spanish-speaking election workers, especially in Florida, Kennedy said. Election officials across the country acknowledge, though, that the problems in Florida could have happened anywhere, she said. "We just don't want it in Lubbock County," she said. "We want no problems with elections (here)." |
| Posted by:Atomic Conspiracy |
| #2 Anyone care to do an INS check on the the 269? |
| Posted by: ed 2004-07-24 4:47:49 PM |
| #1 Why do we need Spanish speaking clerks? Or Arab, Korean, or Eskimo? This is the USA and we speak English here. If you want to vote, learn the friggin language. Can anyone imagine moving to Mexico, Spain, Italy, or Korea and demanding to vote in English? This is a clear demonstration on how far we have fallen as a nation. |
| Posted by: Cyber Sarge 2004-07-24 4:37:13 PM |