The Supreme Court ruled in July that local clerks can have unstaffed absentee vote drop boxes again. However, some smaller, rural towns in Republican-controlled parts of the state have decided not to use them this election season.
It used to be that the conservative majority on the court said drop boxes couldn’t be used unless they were at a local clerk’s office. The current liberal majority overturned that ruling.
Some workers WisPolitics talked to said they didn’t use drop boxes because they were hard to get to or cost too much. Others said there wasn’t a need because people could mail in or bring back their votes.
Some towns and villages were worried about the safety of drop boxes and getting the message to voters consistently about whether drop boxes were available or not.
“The money was the main thing that made it happen,” said Brad Chown, the city clerk of Black River Falls. Black River Falls is in Jackson County in the western part of Wisconsin.
It does not use drop boxes. The city has about 3,500 people. In 2020, Donald Trump, who was president before, won Jackson County. “We thought they were safe, but they were pricey.”
In order to get more votes, Republicans in Wisconsin are encouraging conservative voters to use blank ballots to cast their votes early. But many places that tend to vote Republican are not using drop boxes, for example because they are worried about security.
That could mean that more absentee votes are sent back late in conservative areas. It took more than 1,600 absentee ballots that got to clerks’ offices after the limit of election day in 2022 because drop boxes were not allowed.
There were twice as many absentee ballots in the fall of 2020 as there were in the fall of 2022, but only 689 ballots came after the deadline, according to court records.
Some towns, like Union Grove and Yorkville in Racine County and Brookfield and New Berlin in Waukesha County, have made it illegal to use drop boxes at all. It was Trump who won Racine and Waukesha counties in 2020.
The president of Hartland, Jeff Pfannerstill, chose not to use drop boxes for safety reasons.
He said, “I know that drop boxes aren’t safe.” Only about 9,500 people live in Hartland, which is in Waukesha County.
He said that he believed votes should go straight to a clerk.
“You should treat ballots like cash.” “There’s less chance that something will go wrong all of a sudden if they’re going through fewer hands,” he said.
He said that sending absentee ballots through the mail or returning them in person were both good choices and that “no one is being disenfranchised.”
The city of Medford’s clerk, Ashley Lemke, said that they were still deciding if they would use drop boxes because they didn’t know if the boxes would still be allowed. About 4,300 people live in Medford, which is the county seat of Taylor County in the north central part of Wisconsin.
Trump also won Taylor County in 2020.
In the event that a court rules that you are not permitted to use them, Lemke said, “it is challenging to get that message across.”
To make things even more difficult for the city’s elections board, she said that using drop boxes might make voters less trusting of them.
Lemke said, “A lot of voters don’t trust them because of all the false information that gets spread about elections.” “People don’t like change, even if it makes their lives easier.”
Clerks in other towns and cities are planning to use drop boxes because they are easier for voters and poll staff.
“Sometimes people work and can’t drop off their ballot until after 4:30 or on the weekend,” said David Kurihara, the clerk for Lancaster City. “The drop box in Lancaster is being watched by a security camera.”
This city of about 3,900 people is the county center of Grant County in the southwest of Wisconsin. Trump won this county in 2020. “I think voters don’t care that something is being done wrong.”
For the November election, most of the state’s five biggest cities will use absentee ballot drop boxes. These cities are Milwaukee, Madison, Green Bay, and Racine. Kenosha, on the other hand, has chosen not to use them.
Michelle Nelson, the city clerk and treasurer of Kenosha, told WisPolitics that the decision was made based on a “Best Practices” letter from the Wisconsin Elections Commission in July about how to keep drop boxes safe. It says in the memo that it is not advice.
Nelson said, “When it comes to this, my main concerns are security against tampering and weather.”
She was also worried about the budget, hiring, and use of the drop boxes since the 2020 presidential election, when Kenosha had six of them set up all over the city.
Madison’s website shows 14 drop boxes at fire stations across the city where voters can return absentee ballots. Voters can also return ballots to the city clerk’s office, at in-person absentee voting sites, or at their polling places on Election Day.
The Madison Clerk People who asked Maribeth Witzel-Behl for a comment about how the city uses drop boxes did not hear back.
According to the city’s website, there are 15 drop boxes spread out across Milwaukee. Fourteen of them will be used during the November election. One is being fixed up, so only 13 are in use right now. People can also mail their votes back, go to an Early Voting Center, or do it in person on Election Day.
On the city’s website, it says that the drop boxes in Milwaukee are “secure specialized heavy-duty steel ballot drop boxes that are permanently anchored in place.” The ballot drop boxes are watched over 24 hours a day by trained election officials who make sure they are properly locked, emptied, and protected.
Paulina Gutierrez, who is the executive director of the Milwaukee Election Commission, did not respond to requests for comment or more details.
According to Green Bay Clerk Celestine Jeffreys, the city will also use drop boxes. However, she said that the number will be cut from five in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, to one for the November election.
Jeffreys said the change was made so that there would be one central drop box and “sustainable management and collection process.”
Tara McMenamin, the city clerk of Racine, said that drop boxes will be set up in seven places around the city. These include the Racine Public Library and all but one of the community centers. The drop box in front of City Hall gets the most use, she said. All of Racine’s drop boxes will have security cams that watch over them 24 hours a day, and the city will put security seals on the boxes.
Menamin said that Racine used drop boxes for the primary election in August and doesn’t have any safety worries about the November election yet, but the city is “taking the precautions we can.”