LAURA A. BISCHOFF, SPRINGFIELD NEWS-SUN
COLUMBUS — Ten times as many poor people
are filling out voter registration applications at public assistance
offices in Ohio now than had been doing so before a voting rights
advocacy group won a legal settlement.
In the first six months of
this year, 101,604 low-income Ohioans applied to register to vote
through county departments of jobs and family services. The public
agencies, which have contact with millions of Ohioans each year,
provided applications to 17,000 adults each month compared with just
1,775 a month prior to the lawsuit.
“It is obviously a huge jump
but we knew Ohio wasn’t following the law,” said Nicole Kovite, Project
Vote’s director of the Public Agency Voter Registration Project.
In
2006, ACORN and two individuals teamed up with Project Vote and filed a
lawsuit against the state, alleging that Ohio was not complying with a
1993 federal law that in part mandated public assistance agencies offer
voter registration services. The plaintiffs won a settlement agreement
in November 2009 that requires county public assistance agencies to
train workers, provide clients with applications, and track statistics.
Ohio
was one of four states sued and one of two that reached settlements,
Kovite said.
“The incredible turnaround in Ohio is evidence of
their renewed commitment to low-income voters, and a testament to the
potential of public agency registration nationwide,” she said. “Our hope
is that other underperforming states will not wait to be sued, but will
follow Ohio’s example and comply with this important law.”
Voter applications through county job and family service offices,
January-June 2010:
Montgomery County, 8,475
Butler County,
2,861
Clark County, 1,353
Miami County, 1,203
Warren
County, 865
Greene County, 483
Champaign County, 312
Read the original Springfield Sun-News report here.