Harris County may soon make it a lot easier for residents to vote on Election Day. County Clerk Diane Trautman is set to unveil a plan for countywide voting centers Tuesday at Harris County Commissioners Court.
Trautman wants to make it possible for anyone to vote on Election Day at any of Harris County's 700-plus polling locations. Currently, county residents have multiple options during early voting, but on Election Day, they can only cast a ballot in their home precinct.
"I witnessed personally at several different polling locations on Election Day voters being turned away because they were confused about where their assigned voting location was or something changed or they just didn't have the information," Trautman said. "If you multiply those 700 locations times anywhere from 10 to 100 people being turned away, that's a lot of disenfranchised voters."
Trautman made transitioning to Election Day voting centers one of her top campaign pledges when she ran for election last year. Fifty-two other Texas counties already operate such voting centers. This week's commissioners court will open with a round of public hearings to determine whether Harris County becomes number 53.
