Cleveland County Election Board gets new place with more space
BY JAMES S. TYREE
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Published: November 4, 2009
NORMAN — The Cleveland County Election Board is moving this week to a location that will provide much more space inside and parking outside.
The new address is 641 E Robinson St., Suite 200, in the building next to the
Cleveland County Fairgrounds that used to house the county health department. Election Board
Secretary Paula Roberts said the new office is expected to open Tuesday.
Though the election board is sharing the building with The Christmas Store, Roberts estimates the new office still is three times the size as the present location at 122 S Peters Ave. The election board will have half of the building’s first floor and its entire second floor.
"We won’t have to move something just to do something, and then move it back,” said staff member Jodi Marti.
Roberts said the new location is "excellent for in-person voting because there’s so much more parking.”
"One main reason we wanted to move from downtown,” she said, "is because of the parking. And on Saturdays there will be even more because the state and county buildings next to us will be closed.”
Cleveland County commissioners approved the election board’s move in September so the office could move before the county’s Dec. 8 election. Norman residents will vote on a school bond and
Oklahoma City residents within the county will vote on the next MAPS project.
Also that week, election board staff also will accept and process school board candidate filings Dec. 7-9 for cities and towns throughout the county.
"We’d like to move a little earlier so we wouldn’t have to worry about the election, but I’m really glad we’re not moving any later,” Roberts said.
Roberts said much of the county’s voting supplies had to be kept in storage because there wasn’t enough room in the downtown office. Now, everything related to the election board is housed under one roof.
The new office will have a voter registration up front near an extended customer service counter. For staff members, it has several storage rooms for records, files, regular and absentee ballots, voting booths, machines and tubs. The Dec. 8 ballots are locked in storage there.
The second floor will include a spacious training area for precinct volunteers. Roberts said state law requires volunteers to be trained every two years.
The office’s main telephone number will remain 366-0210.
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