Category: News and Views
This one's for all the Americans out there. I'm not 18 yet but I plan to vote when I'm able to next year. However, I'm a little woried. I'm totally blind and I'm not sure how I'll cast my ballot. I'd probably have to bring a friend or family member with me but I don't know if I'm comfortable with that. I heard they want to develop accesible voting machines. Does anyone know if any progress has been made in doing this? Also, if you vote (which you should), how do you do it? Thanks.
I vote, and I just have a family member fill it out for me. They had had an accessible voting machine one of the times, but I wasn't even sure how it worked, and I don't think most of the people working there knew much on it either. Plus, I don't think it even worked.
Although I don't mind having someone help with filling out the ballots, it would be nicer to get to do it myself though. *smiles*
Leilani
I usually go to an advanced polling station. Not sure if they have those in the States, but one would assume so. In any event, I go there, and I go behind a curtain. A template is placed over the ballot such that each place for an X has a little hole in the template. Someone tells me the order of the names, and then I mark the one I choose, take the ballot out of the template, fold it, and put it in the box.
Since the last time I posted to this topic, I've used an accessible voting machine several times and love it! I still don't mind if I'll need someone to read the ballot to me, but whenever possible, I use the machine. Although they make the person helping you recite something so they can't influence how you vote and have to put down whoever you choose, I like knowing that I can and being able to fill out the ballots on my own.