Council Approves New Boundaries for Voting Precincts, Talks Budget

By Amber Lester Kennedy Friday, April 15, 2011

The boundaries of Williamsburg’s two voting precincts will be redrawn to bring the city into compliance with state code.

Members of the City Council unanimously approved two amendments to city code related to the voting precincts at its Thursday meeting.

The first amendment relocates the boundary lines for both the Berkeley and the Stryker voting precincts. With 6,324 registered voters, the Stryker precinct is well above the state code’s required limit of 5,000 registered voters per precinct. By contrast, Berkeley district has just 2,898 registered voters.

Once the new boundaries go into effect, the Berkeley district will have 4,529 voters and the Stryker district will have 4,767 voters. All elections are citywide, so the biggest effect on voters will be a change in polling locations.

Tom Mainor, who served as vice chair of the electoral board until Feb. 28, explained they also have to comply with a federal limit of 4,000 people per precinct casting votes in presidential elections.

The second requested amendment relocates the Central Absentee precinct from the Stryker Building to the new Municipal Building, due to the upcoming relocation of the Voter Registrar’s Office. Before either action could be taken, the city had to authorize City Attorney Christina Shelton to pursue obtaining pre-clearance from the Department of Justice under the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Obtaining pre-clearance typically takes 90 days, so the ordinance likely will not take effect until mid-July.

At Thursday’s meeting, Vice-Mayor Paul Freiling noted the new precincts will still be very close to the 5,000-voter limit and wondered what would happen if the number of voters increased. Registrar Win Sowder said in that instance, localities are allowed to investigate how many of the registered voters still live in the city and can purge any names and addresses that are no longer valid.

This is done through a confirmation mailing, in which letters are sent to registered voters and when some come back unopened, the registrar’s office and post office further investigate where the voter now resides. Sowder said the city conducted a confirmation mailing last year, and she hopes to do another one this year, but the process depends on state funding.

Council member Judy Knudson suggested the council consider renaming the precincts, which were named for polling locations that are no longer in use. “We want to make it easy to find the place you are voting,” she said. “We want to make it easier, convenient and more logical.”

Budget Discussion

At the same meeting, the board members discussed altering the proposed funding for economic development and tourism promotion.

Mayor Clyde Haulman introduced the idea of giving the Economic Development Authority more funding. Currently, the city gives the EDA $50,000 from the contingency fund. That money goes toward funding some of its programs, such as its e-commerce grants, sign replacement grants and demolition forgivable loans. Freiling, who serves as council’s EDA liaison, said the EDA could run out of funds before the end of the fiscal year.

Haulman said he’d like to see their funding increased to $100,000 or allocated differently, in order to give the EDA easier access to its funding without having to come back to Council if it needs more money. City Manager Jack Tuttle said he could investigate the options, but reminded council that the money would have to be cut from somewhere else in the budget.

Councilman Doug Pons, who owns the former Quarterpath Inn (now a Knights Inn), suggested the council reconsider the city’s funding for tourism promotion. “I still have some issue with sending money to the [Greater Williamsburg Chamber and Tourism Alliance] unconditionally,” he said, adding that he didn’t feel the Alliance has set goals to make a discernible difference in attracting tourists.

His fellow board members disagreed with his assessment of the Alliance’s efforts, with Knudson noting tourism has declined nationally. Haulman said council has no way of knowing what the tourism numbers would have looked like if the city hadn’t contributed to the Alliance’s efforts.

Freiling suggested the city approach the issue by asking what they would like the revenues to be and figure out how to get there. Most of the board seemed to agree they won’t be ready to consider Pons’ suggestion before the budget is set to be adopted on May 12. Find more information about the budget here.