Some Gluckstadt residents will have a new place to cast their votes come June 5, when the next Senate and U.S. House race will take place.
Madison County citizen Julia Hodges brought the issue to the board of supervisors, asking that an additional voting precinct be created, hopefully easing the burden on St. Joseph Catholic Church.
“(The new precinct) would be at Vertical Church on Gluckstadt Road, which is right (across from) Reunion Farms,” Hodges said. “It’s a huge church with a big parking lot and great entrances and exits from and to Gluckstadt.”
Hodges said the current issue with St. Joseph Catholic Church is that it gets overwhelmed when residents go to vote.
“We have 4,500 people at this church voting. Eighty-two percent of those people voted at the presidential election. They were parking everywhere — on the grass, around the corner. There were lines all day long. It’s just too small of a precinct to handle that many people.”
Residents living west of Bozeman and Catlett roads, north of Gluckstadt Road, east of Mississippi Highway 463 and south of Stribling Road will be included in the new precinct.
Neighborhoods included will be Ashbrooke, Providence, Johnstone, Hartfield, Devlin Springs, Falls Crossing, and the newly-approved 600-home development that has not been built yet.
“Now that y’all have this new subdivision off Dewees Road, technically those people would go into (St. Joseph) Catholic, which would add even more to that precinct, so we need to separate that precinct out,” Hodges said. “That will alleviate St. Joseph Catholic… It would also take out numbers from China Grove, the small church on 463 across from Annandale.”
Hodges said the new precinct needs to be approved 90 days before the senate and house election, and that she and others have been working with the county circuit clerk to make it happen.
“We’re going to have to work with the circuit clerk to send out new voter registration cards to all of these houses. Plus, we’re going to talk to the homeowner associations and try to get the word out through social media…”
Hodges added that the day before the June 5 election, signs will be placed outside affected subdivisions to try and alert residents where their new voting location is.
“We’ll try to let them know as much as we can,” she said. “I think overall, they’re going to be pleased, because so many of these people have to stand in line all day long. It’s crazy at that precinct. But we’re happy that they’re all coming out to vote… Eighty-two percent is huge. It’s the number-one voting precinct we have in the entire county.”
The board unanimously approved Hodges’ request.
click for more info: https://northsidesun.com/sites/default/files/Election%20Precincts.pdf
