Commission shoots down mail-in voting

The Hill County Commission voted down this morning a resolution to allow for mail-in ballots for the 2020 general election at their weekly business meeting Thursday, with Hill County Commissioners Diane McLean and Mark Peterson voting no and Hill County Commissioner Mike Wendland voting yes.

The resolution would have allowed the county to send ballots to all active registered voters on which they could vote and mail in.

Absentee ballots will still be available.

Peterson said he has received almost universally negative responses from people in the area about a mail-in ballot.

Three people attended the meeting and raised concerns about the prospect of mail-in voting and what affect it would have on the integrity of Hill County's votes.

Hill County Clerk and Recorder Sue Armstrong said the process would be largely identical to the June primary, which she said was very successful and resulted in significantly higher turnout, and that neither she nor her department would have supported the resolution if they believed it had the potential to compromise the integrity of Hill County's votes.

She said not passing the resolution would make the vote chaotic since the average age of the county's election judges is 69, and in-person voting poses risk to them as well as voters.

Armstrong said it was disappointing that the commission did not have the backs of the employees who will need to deal with in-person voting.

Watch for more in Friday’s edition of The Havre Daily News.