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Editorial: Make sure your vote counts

 
Published March 2, 2016

Floridians who plan to vote by mail should take care to ensure their ballots are valid. Thousands of absentee ballots across the state have already been coded as problematic by county elections staff and may not be counted in Florida's March 15 primary. Voter mistakes are the most common culprit. Floridians should not allow preventable errors to suppress their votes.

Elections officials around the state have received more than 690,000 absentee ballots for Florida's March 15 presidential primary. More than 8,500 of those ballots have already been deemed invalid because they were not signed or had another voter error. The largest problem is in Miami-Dade County, which had 1,951 questionable ballots as of Tuesday. The principal problem with the ballots in question involved signatures. More than 800 ballots lacked a signature. In the bay area, there were far fewer error-prone ballots. Pinellas County, for example, had just 409 potentially invalid ballots. Hillsborough had 608, and Pasco recorded 169. Problems with ballots persisted despite education campaigns aimed at getting voters to update their signatures.

The large number of mail ballots arriving at elections offices around the state is a good sign for democracy. Citizens should want to make their voices heard, and elections supervisors should make it as easy as possible for people to vote. But voters have a responsibility that goes beyond just showing up at the polls on election day or hastily filling out an absentee ballot and dropping it in the mail. People who will plan to vote on election day or take advantage of early voting, which began on Monday in Hillsborough and starts on Saturday in Pinellas, Pasco and Hernando, should make sure they have valid identification and update their addresses with the supervisor of elections office. Otherwise, voters face the prospect of having to cast a provisional ballot, which might not be counted.

Floridans who vote by mail should make sure the signature they have on file with their elections supervisor matches the one they currently use. They also should fill out their ballots completely and sign the envelope. Voters who have already turned in their ballots and are unsure whether they signed their envelope should check with the supervisor of elections. The issue can be fixed by March 14. Mismatched signatures will go before a three-member canvassing board in the county in which the vote was cast. That board will determine if a ballot is valid or should be tossed.

Voting is a serious responsibility and should be the right of every American citizen. To exercise this right, voters must follow the rules and pay attention. Disenfranchisement by carelessness is a frivolous waste of an American privilege.