Voting Accessibility News From Tennessee

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Work has begun to bring 16 voter polling places in Greene County into compliance with the Americans With Disabilities Act in time for elections in May.

“We’ve finished the process to determine which precinct polling places need improvements,” County Mayor Roger Jones said this week during a tour of three polling places that need the most work.

The Greene County Commission voted late last year to spend up to $1,500 per polling place to achieve compliance with the Americans With Disabilities Act.

Of the county’s 36 precinct polling places, “16 need something done,” Jones said. “A lot of the work is as simple as replacing hardware,” he added.

For example, all 16 precincts need to have doorknobs replaced with lever-operated door openers.

Several of the precincts need to have doors that are too narrow replaced. Jones and Dave Wright, the architect for the project, said doors need to be 36 inches wide to meet ADA requirements.

In addition, Jones and Wright said, several of the polling places will need handicapped access ramps, though in some cases these ramps will only need to rise a few inches.

Twelve of the polling places will have to have two handicapped parking spaces either paved with asphalt or paved with concrete, and connected by a hard-surface sidewalk to the door, Jones said.