Insist on easier elections

The Counterculture in the 1960s used to like to say that “If voting really made a difference, they wouldn’t let you do it.” Those words have been haunting me lately, in the wake of the Aug. 8 primary election and in the wake of some hard thinking about recycling. So what do voting and recycling have in common? Let me explain.

I noticed Barry County finally is going to attempt to encourage people to do the right thing with a voluntary curbside recycling program, something that’s been long overdue around here. The best way to get people to do the right thing is either make it convenient for them or penalize them if they don’t (see: seat belt use in automobiles). If people can set their recyclable materials out on the curb for pickup just like they do for garbage, a far greater number will take part in the process to reduce solid waste. I’m not ashamed to tell everyone I think it’s a good thing.

Hastings about 15 years had a group of high school students present a proposal for curbside recycling to the City Council, but it was shot down because the teens forgot to stroke the inflated ego of No. 1 Barry County blowhard Dr. V. Harry Adrounie, who showed up at a subsequent meeting half in the bag (this, according to an impeccable source) to admonish the kids for not going through the proper channels by asking him first. But now, thanks to Mark Doster and Don Boysen, citizens in Thornapple Township are the first in Barry County to try out a voluntary program that will cost them $25 a year.

Now, for the voting. If we can make it easier for people to vote, I think they’ll do it in larger numbers than they currently do. After almost all elections almost everywhere, the area newspapers are inundated with letters to the editor decrying the low numbers at the polls, like 23% in Barry County’s Aug. 8 primary, the highest in this area. What seems to be overlooked is that in today’s modern society, with both Mom and Dad working outside the home, there’s little time you can set aside for going to the polls.

Most elections are held on Tuesdays, which customarily are work days. Most folks these days are working or traveling to and from work in the hours between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. With the polls open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m., that leaves only one hour in the morning and two hours in the evening as a reasonable window of opportunity. And don’t forget Junior’s soccer practice and Molly’s clarinet lessons, not to mention somehow finding enough time to make and gather to eat dinner together.

What I’m saying is that it’s becoming increasingly difficult for ordinary workaday Americans to set aside time to exercise their right to vote. And if voting is inconvenient and perhaps even a hassle for many, why should they bother, no matter what we political freaks say about its importance? We need to make it easier for the masses of ordinary Americans to do it. Resistance, or the infamous process known as “that’s the way we’ve always done it,” these days almost sounds like the political party in power, the GOP, doesn’t really want the unwashed masses to vote, so let’s keep making it inconvenient, let’s just keep things the way they are so the priviledged and powerful will have even more control over the process. I say we must find a way to try mail-in voting or even Internet voting as a way for citizens to fill out their ballot selections in the privacy and comfort of their own homes.

I’m already hearing the objections. Some warn of the dangers of fraud, yet few dispute sending their money via the mail or over the Internet- in fact, the system we have already sends vote total via Internet to a central database to be tabulated- I have my concerns about the system now in use but the fact is that it can be done in a way that provides safeguards and offers alternate methods for vote counting to ensure no fraud or theft is committed. We have seen in several recent elections problems with the current system and yet the status quo prevails- and when changes are made they just seem to be a way of throwing big contracts to campaign contributors. With anything there is a certain amount of risk. We just have to have the courage and will to change and the wisdom to do it right.

Another contrary comment is that anyone these days can get an absentee ballot and send it in. But that involves bureaucratic hassles and puts the onus on the citizen rather than forcing the government to provide a service by making the ballots readily and easily available to the people. Also, current events have a way of changing political reality- those that vote weeks in advance via USPS may not be able to change their vote if last minute news happens that alters the dyanamic of the race.

As long as we keep voting the same way our ancestors did 200 years ago, we’re going to continue to see declining numbers, because it’s just not as easy as it used to be to set aside time to go to the polls, stand in line and do your duty. We make it more convenient these days for people to pay their taxes (on line or by mail), more convenient to buy license plates and easier to have all kinds of important interactions with government, many of us do our banking online or shop for Christmas presents, but somehow we don’t want to change the voting system to accommodate modern realities. Casting a ballot for elected office should be as simple and quick as ordering a meal at a fast food restaurant or buying a book from Amazon.com- American citizens are used to fast and efficient service and our government should respond my making elections run more smoothly and efficiently.

There are many other needed and effective changes that can be made to our current election and voting systems and schemes- online voting is but a start, but one that would have instant dividends by increasing interest and turnout in elections especially in younger generations which are woefully under-represented in the current political process. I also think we need to look at instant runoff voting and proportional representation as ways to increase the small "d" democracy in our big "D" Democracy. We must push our elected leaders to alter the system that got them into office which is something that not many of them are eager to do.

Let’s not let the powers that be pull what Harry Adrounie did on those high school kids, let’s insist on curbside recycling and homeside voting. Let’s tell Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land and all city, county and village clerks what the late Ward Weiler used to tell the County Board: “You work for us, not the other way around.”