Tons Of Voting Boxes, New Polling Location Downtown
CHICAGO (CBS) – An old Walgreens will be turned Monday into an official Chicago Board of Elections Annex in downtown.
The former Walgreens, located on 15 W. Washington will open Monday as an official polling place. The site will offer 140 to 150 voting boxes, CBS 2's Suzanne Le Mignot reports.
Chicago Board of Election Commissioners Executive Director Lance Gough, walked CBS 2's Suzanne Le Mignot through the site, as it makes final adjustments.
The idea for the new downtown voting site came up during the primary, Gough said. The voting location at 69 W. Washington, only has about 45 machines.
"We had people standing in line and the big thing is," Gough said. "People standing in line get tired and leave. Some people leave and I don't want to lose any voters. So that's why we decided to come up with an annex, where we could have as many machines as we could possibly fit, in a room."
The site will be covered by a Chicago police officer, 24 hours a day, Gough said in response to a concern of voter fraud.
"We're hard wired to our office," Gough said. "So we have real time access. So if somebody registered and voted here and tried to vote someplace else, they'd be flagged."
The voting annex will be open seven days a week; 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday, and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday. The week before the election, the site will stay open until 7 p.m. each night.
Voters can register to vote and cast a ballot on the same day there. The early voting site also welcomes all voters, no matter what part of the city you live.
