Hurricanes destroyed Florida polling places, displaced voters

By BILL KACZOR
Associated Press Writer
PENSACOLA, Fla.
Carl Burns didn't want to take a chance on losing his vote to Hurricane Ivan so he cast an absentee ballot.

"I don't know if my old polling place is going to be there or not," said the 76-year-old retired claims manager from Pensacola.

Ivan and three other hurricanes that struck Florida this year left more than 90 polling places in shambles and displaced thousands of voters whose homes were damaged or destroyed, but election officials say they are taking steps to make sure everyone will have an opportunity to cast a ballot.

Most are predicting that turnouts, aided by early and absentee voting, will equal or exceed other presidential years.

Gov. Jeb Bush has issued an executive order permitting the U.S. Postal Service to forward absentee ballots, if requested by county election officials, to make sure they get to hurricane refugees. Forwarding normally is prohibited.

Polling places for 10 of Escambia County's 90 precincts were lost when Ivan hit the Florida Panhandle in mid-September, but election chief Bonnie Jones has found replacements for each.

Another Escambia precinct was moved from the voting machine warehouse so it can be used to count votes because the downtown Pensacola building that housed the tabulation center was destroyed.

"The roof blew off," Jones said. "The top of the elevator shaft blew off, too."

In neighboring Santa Rosa County, 15,000 requests for absentee ballots have been received, twice as many as four years ago, said Supervisor of Elections Ann Bodenstein. She attributes much of the increase to voters who have relocated at least temporarily because of Ivan.

Bodenstein has relocated five polling places - two damaged by Ivan and three near areas where damaged trees are being cut in the Blackwater River State Forest.

She also wants her staff to be understanding of hurricane victims.

"I told my poll workers 'Just put your arms around them,'" Bodenstein said. "They're all going to have stories to tell."

She can tell her own story. The longtime elections worker faced no general election opponent after winning the Republican primary Aug. 31. Incumbent supervisor Doug Wilkes, who did not seek re-election, resigned so Bush could let Bodenstein take over immediately and serve the rest of his term.

In the meantime, Ivan's storm surge inundated Bodenstein's waterfront home near Milton.

"I think they are going to want me to bulldoze it," she said.

She has been sleeping on the couch at her ex-husband's house.

"We get along fine," she said.

In August, Bush appointed Jeff Ussery, another longtime elections worker, as supervisor in Hardee County when his predecessor Dean Cullins, 60, died of a heart attack three days after Hurricane Charley slammed into southwest Florida.

A power outage and exertion from clearing fallen tree limbs around his house aggravated a pre-existing medical condition, making Cullins the county's only hurricane death counted by state officials.

Ussery also is dealing with damage to his Wauchula office and polling places. Some precincts were being used by emergency crews, so Ussery doubled up the county's 12 precincts at six sites for the primary.

He expects to have all but one polling place back in service Nov. 2. The other will be in the usual place but in a different building or a tent. The supervisor's office had some roof damage but no equipment was lost.

Indian River County lost 11 of its 48 polling places to Hurricane Frances in early September. Supervisor of Elections Kay Clem has replaced two sites and moved other lost precincts to different polling places.

Clem had been worried that her voting machines stored in modular units at Vero Beach would fall prey to Frances.

"I just knew they were going to be floating down the Indian River," she recalled.

Clem wanted to move them to the sheriff's office but was unable to before the storm struck. Good thing, too, because Frances destroyed the sheriff's building but the modular units were intact.

Hurricane Jeanne in late September may have been responsible for an Oct. 14 computer crash that postponed a pre-election test of touch-screen voting machines in Palm Beach County. Outgoing election chief Theresa LePore suspects the storm cut off power and air conditioning to a room with a heat-sensitive server. Charlotte County lost most of its 80 polling places to Charley in August. Those precincts were consolidated into 22 super polling places for the primary. Turnout was only 18 percent compared to 24 percent four years ago.

"I hate to say I was pleased about an 18 percent turnout, but with all the things we went through I thought that was good," said Supervisor of Elections Judy Anderson.

Water got into a former bank vault and damage about 20 touch-screen machines, but they will not be used, Anderson said. Charley also damaged her Punta Gorda office.

"I'm sitting here with holes in my ceiling," Anderson said, looking up at insulation poking through the openings.

She is expecting a turnout of nearly 80 percent for the general election. Many damaged polling places have been repaired, but Charlotte still will have a dozen multiple polling places, each with two to five precincts.

In neighboring DeSoto County, Supervisor of Elections Mark Negley expects to double up two of his 15 precincts at one site and use a tent at another where the building is occupied by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Charley had no apparent affect on primary turnout in DeSoto, where it was fractionally higher that the 26 percent for the 2000 primary.

"Things are not normal," Negley said from Arcadia. "But they are more normal than they were at the end of August."