The Wrong Voting Fix

Public-housing tenants may be freezing without heat or hot water and the subways may be crumbling, but Gov. Cuomo and Mayor de Blasio have both decided that what New Yorkers really need is . . . easier voting.

So the gov just announced he’ll provide $7 million for a statewide program mandating every county to provide access to a voting booth during the 12 days leading up to Election Day. And the mayor means to hire a chief democracy officer to get another million New Yorkers, including 17-yearolds, registered to vote.

None of which addresses the real problems with New York’s voting system.

For the record, one risk of early voting became apparent last year, when a candidate won a special US House election in Montana the day after being charged with as- saulting a reporter — when nearly half the ballots had already been cast.

With exceptions for deployed servicemembers and the like, all voters should go to the polls with the same set of facts before them. Expanding Election Day to 24 hours would address any problem of insufficient time to vote — though access to the voting booth is far from the biggest flaw in New York’s system.

Of greater consequence: boards of elections, controlled by political bosses, that are little more than patronage mills. And a broken primary system, especially in special elections, that leaves the selection of candidates in those same bosses’ hands.

Then again, maybe Cuomo and de Blasio should think twice: Getting more people to vote might wind up waking them up to New York’s bigger political problems.