What kind of building do you do your voting in?

My school district gets the day off today because the schools are the only real place they have to vote around here.

My last polling place was an elementary school. Just moved and have not voted in the new area yet.

My kitchen. Almost everyone in my community votes by mail.

A church hall.

We also vote by mail. There are places you can go in on election day if you want/need to vote in person (example: homeless). But we get the ballot a few weeks before the election. You just mail it in. On election day they put out a lot of those big blue mail boxes like the USPS use and you can just drop it one of those.

A small township hall or the fire hall.

A local hotel donates one of their meeting rooms. It is much better than the one we used in the township building when I was Judge of Elections.

Elementary school.

Church.

In FL it was the library.

The hall at the local Methodist Church.

A building that was an elementary school but is going to be converted into some type of township/community use.

A restaurant.

small township hall

A faculty meeting room at the local middle school. The next town over uses the fellowship room at a church that I used to attend.

A church hall

My polling place is the basement of a Methodist church.

Gym of our local H.S. in my hometown

I’m surprised at how many vote in churches.

@wilma Well, around here they are everywhere, so I guess it is convenient. Out in more rural areas there seem to be more churches per square 5 miles than schools or libraries. That probably has something to do with it I’m guessing.

@wilma, I think @JLeslie is right. And it’s not just in rural areas. I live in the burbs and there are churches everywhere. Allowing their buildings to be used for voting is a service they provide the community. It’s convenient for me as the church I vote in is only about 5 blocks from my house. A lot of churches around here that are on bus routes also offer their parking lots as designated “Park & Ride” locations because the lots are generally empty during the week as a service to the community. And the part of the church I vote in, the basement isn’t at all churchy. It has gray painted cinder block walls and a painted concrete floor. Except when you drive up to it, you wouldn’t even know it was church when you vote.

and @Kardamom I wouldn’t like to vote by mail. I’m kind of a voting nerd and I like the process of doing it in person, the ritual; and in my state, they announce you after you’ve voted. You exit the booth, hand the poll worker the card they give you and the poll worker says “Lilly Coyote has voted.” I love that part. :-)

@wilma I should add I am in the south now, so lots of a little churches everywhere. As opposed to areas that have more Catholicism, which is more likely the religion around you, the Catholics tend to have larger churches not as close together. Generally. It’s a generalization of course. My husband could not get over all the churches when we first moved to the south, we have them in shopping centers, let alone the free standing ones.

My polling station is a community center next to a small church. Most likely not part of that church.

@wilma Churches often feel that they ought to be available for the community. I went to one once that had arranged to let the city use its fellowship hall and restaurant-grade kitchen in the event of disasters. Other churches that I have seen sit atop fallout shelters, run homeless-feeding operations, and host Boy Scouts.

I know that churches are very often the place to go for all kinds of resources and help in communities. (I’m a volunteer at the only food pantry in my community. It is sponsored by a group of churches and housed in a church.)
I’m just a bit surprised that the people who are so adamant about religion being bad and corrupt, are not complaining about having to go to a church to vote in a government election.

@wilma I don’t know if I fall into the group you would classify as thinking religion is bad and corrupt, but I can tell you for me I don’t mind if church groups use public property for services, like renting a room in a municipal building or school, so using a church for voting seems to be the same type of thing. It’s about convenience and ccooperation in the community in my view.

Yes, @wilma, I agree with @JLeslie. They are just providing a polling place. I suppose some member of the church is around somewhere, to lock up afterwards, but I never seen anyone the church where I vote that wasn’t either voting or a poll worker, except for the people who have their kids in tow. It really doesn’t bother me. When it comes to an election, the church; it’s just a building, nothing more.

And it would be illegal for anyone at the church to post any materials or attempt to approach you if it could be perceived as an attempt to influence your vote. “Electioneering” is illegal at polling places, though I think the distance and what constitutes electioneering may vary from state to state. In my state it’s within fifty feet and includes:

”….political discussion of issues, candidates or partisan topics, the wearing of any button, banner or other object referring to issues, candidates or partisan topics, the display, distribution or other handling of literature or any writing or drawing referring to issues, candidates or partisan topics, the deliberate projection of sound referring to issues, candidates or partisan topics from loudspeakers or otherwise into the polling place or the area within 50 feet of the entrance to the building in which the voting room is located.”

Anyway, I have no choice. If you vote in person, you are required to vote at your designated polling place. However, there’s no religion going on in the part of church where and when I vote, so voting there doesn’t bother me at all.

@JLeslie and @lillycoyote I wasn’t thinking that it would bother you, I really don’t know how either of you feel about the subject.
I think it’s great that they use whatever facilities that are available to use. Most churches are probably handicap accessible, have bathroom facilities and the space to set up.
My thought was that the church building was paid for and supported by religious people and that some people wouldn’t think it was a suitable place for a government election.
Maybe it’s just that some folks on Fluther are so anti religion/Christianity, that I have been getting a skewed idea about how the wider world feels about it.
I have voted in schools and fire halls, township halls, libraries and community centers. I’m not sure that I have ever voted in a church.

@wilma I didn’t take it personally, just offering my view. I am very separation of church and state oriented, and an atheist, so I thought maybe I might fit into your thought process regarding your surprise on the topic.

@wilma I didn’t take it personally either. I’m not any atheist by I’m not anything else either. :-)

I hope I didn’t come across as defensive or hostile in any way…

No @lillycoyote you didn’t and neither did @JLeslie.

@wilma Oh, there are complainers. Some people have pushed to remove all religious symbolism from the actual polling room. And yes, one chuckles a bit – it’s a church! Of course it’s going to have religious icons! – and invites those hard-working voters to help themselves to a cup of juice and a cookie on that table over there.

@Nullo Yes, they are so evil, with those cups of juice and a cookies of theirs. :- ) I vote in a church and I doesn’t bother me one bit at all. Though I never get juice and cookies when I vote! Is it because they’re United Methodists? Is the UMC anti-juice and anti-cookie? :- )

@lillycoyote I don’t know about your state but in Pennsylvania, it is illegal for political organizations to provide refreshments or anything else in the voting area and they are supposed to remain at least 50 feet from the polling place. The only refreshments there are for the staff and they aren’t supposed to pass it around.

@Ron_C I guess that’s why I never get juice and cookies. :-) No, as I mentioned in one of my previous posts above, in my state, engaging in electioneering within 50 feet of a polling place and what constitute electioneering, as defined by the statute, which I also quoted, is pretty broad. IN some states the distance might be 100 feet but I imagine it’s illegal everywhere. That’s one of the reasons it doesn’t bother me to vote in a church. No one can get near the voters. I’m not sure why it might concern anyone all that much; for the purposes of voting, it’s just a building.

My church doesn’t offer me cookies, and I can’t even remember a cross hanging in that particular room, but maybe there is? I never feel like I am in a church on voting day. I have never had anyone ever mention religion or try to sway a vote. I live in a very very Republican area, and when I go in for primaries and get my Democrat card, no one has ever looked at me sideways. I know several of the people who volunteer, and they still check my ID, they check everyones. They go by the book.

@JLeslie Yeah, I don’t recall seeing any kind of religious symbols in area of the church I vote in, in the basement, it’s kind of an ugly, bunkerish looking room and as I mention above, there must be someone from the church around, maybe somewhere in the building, to lock up when the polls close, but the only people who are ever there in the room are voters, their kids, if they bring them along and poll workers.

@lillycoyote Well, I’ve heard that Methodists are an odd bunch… My guess is that yours is an old-growth church that’s not looking for new members.

@Ron_C Churches aren’t political organizations any more than a bowling team would be.

@Nullo Churches are no more exempt from attempts to influence voters on election day than anyother business. Therefore they do not provide refreshements for the voters. That would be considered an attempt to influence them.

Further, it is illegal for churches to endorse candidates, if they do, they loose their religious exemption and to most churches money trumps ethics.

@Ron_C As I recall, churches don’t actually need to incorporate at all. Many of them do, to provide the pastor with some liability protection and so on. And some of them don’t. These unincorporated churches can endorse whoever they like, if anyone.

In any case, the church did offer refreshments, and the people running the polls didn’t seem to care. I conclude, then, that the prohibition is specifically aimed at electioneering: debating, distributing pamphlets, giving speeches, or the wearing of Party-themed clothing and accessories. Cookies are about as apolitical as you can possibly get, provided that they aren’t cunningly arranged to spell things.

Voters are routinely barred from voting while wearing political t-shirts. Never fails to cause drama.

Village Hall! They just put a banner up saying “Polling Station”.