Fiserv Forum and Miller Park to be used as early voting locations
Fiserv Forum and Miller Park will be used as early voting locations for the November general election, which is expected to draw large numbers of absentee ballots as residents seek to vote in the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, officials announced Monday.
Neither location will be used for voting on Election Day, Nov. 3.
“Just as it’s important to have as many options that are large and safe for in-person absentee voting, it’s equally as important that we keep neighborhood-based voting on Nov. 3 so that voters who might have transportation issues or find it more convenient to vote at their neighborhood polling place are able to do so,” Milwaukee Election Commission Executive Director Claire Woodall-Vogg said at a news conference Monday outside Fiserv Forum.
Right now, the city has 170 voting locations for Nov. 3, and Woodall-Vogg said she is working to get closer to the normal 180 sites.
Fiserv Forum is expected to be an indoor early voting location, while Miller Park is envisioned as a drive-thru where voters can cast their ballots.
Milwaukee is expected to play a key role in the general election, when voters will cast their ballots for president.
In June, the Milwaukee Common Council held a hastily called, late-night meeting — and Mayor Tom Barrett performed a late-night signing — to meet a deadline to set in-person early voting locations for the August and November elections.
Woodall-Vogg said the city hopes there will not be any legal challenges to the addition of the two sites.
The city’s hope is that in any legal challenge decision-makers would recognize that voters are trying to cast their ballots in the middle of a pandemic and “that our voters’ safety comes first,” she said.
She also said that in 2018 and 2016 the city didn’t announce its in-person early voting locations until around this time.
“It’s really my belief that voter access should really be prioritized,” WoodallVogg said. “In April, we were given the discretion to alter our in-person election day sites and with the ongoing pandemic and seeing our turnout numbers really be shocking for our early voting in August, I think it’s very justified.”
Woodall-Vogg said after the Aug. 11 partisan primary that the city counted 50,191 absentee ballots, and that she expected the city to process between 150,000 and 200,000 absentee ballots come November.
“We were trying to find a way to allow people to come to a facility where there would be easy access, where it would be very, very important to provide the social distancing and that was centrally located in the city of Milwaukee so all residents could benefit from it,” Barrett said.
Instead of finding one location, the city found two, Barrett said.
The Milwaukee Bucks announced in July an effort to partner with basketball star LeBron James’ voting rights group More Than A Vote to make Fiserv Forum available as a potential voting site. Inperson absentee voting begins Oct. 20.
On Tuesday, the Milwaukee Common Council will take up a measure approving the additional in-person absentee voting sites in the city.
“With the number of people who are looking for alternative ways to vote, we need to acclimate to that, especially during this time where there is a global health pandemic going on,” Common Council President Cavalier Johnson said.