City of Milwaukee Expands Early Voting to 14 Locations for the 2020 General Election

MILWAUKEE— October 20, 2020, Mayor Barrett, Election Commission Executive Director Claire Woodall-Vogg and Common Council President Cavalier Johnson highlighted the importance of early voting in the 2020 presidential election.

In-person absentee voting begins Tuesday, October 20 and runs until Sunday, November 1. The City of Milwaukee has expanded its early voting locations from three sites in 2016 to 14 sites this year. Milwaukee’s early voting schedule offers 1,092 hours of operations over the course of the next 12 days.

All early voting sites will practice physical distancing, require mask compliance and practice frequent disinfection. Voters can feel confident that they will have a safe and healthy early voting experience.

“We are working hard to make sure that people exercise their fundamental right to be involved in our democracy,” said Mayor Tom Barrett. “We have twin objectives: we want to have an election that is beyond reproach in terms of the integrity of the election, but we also want all the individuals who are standing in line to vote to be safe. We want this to be an election where people will look at the results of the election, not how the election is conducted.”

Early voting provides access to voting for citizens that have historically been presented with barriers to casting a ballot: working families, individuals with multiple jobs, students, parents with limited childcare and seniors with limited transportation.

The pandemic has created even more challenges for voters who are experiencing economic hardships, instability and uncertainty. The City of Milwaukee is taking the unprecedented step to expand early voting sites and provide evening and weekend hours despite the pandemic to provide fair access to voting for all residents.

“We encourage residents, whether you are voting by mail, early in-person or on Election Day, make sure that you have a plan to vote. Make sure that you have a plan for your voice to be heard in this critical election,” said Common Council President Cavalier Johnson.

Voters must bring a photo ID with them to their early voting location. Important to note, the ID does not need to have a current address. If a voter would like to make an address change, they have until October 30 to early vote. Voters who are worried about voting early in-person still have the option to request an absentee ballot by mail.

“We’ve had over a third of our registered voters request absentee ballots by mail, which I think is a very promising statistic, but until early voting gets underway we won’t have a clear idea of whether we will start to break records like we are seeing in other states with voter turnout,” said Election Commission Executive Director Claire Woodall-Vogg, “I’m very hopeful. Our registration statistics in the month of September were just overwhelming: We had over 38,000 registrations submitted after we sent out a SafeVote postcard with the Common Council to encourage voters to register in advance.”

Early voting sites were selected based on geographic diversity and include Midtown, the Zeidler Municipal Building, eight neighborhood libraries and new additions such as the Clinton Rose Senior Center and Cannon Park Pavilion.

Additionally, recognizing that students often experience some of the greatest challenges to voting, the City is partnering with UW-Milwaukee and MATC to provide on-campus early voting locations.

Voters may register on-site with a proof of residence document, except on October 31 and November 1. To check your registration status and view a sample ballot, visit myvote.wi.gov.

In-Person Absentee (Early Voting) Schedule:

Frank P. Zeidler Municipal Building, 841 N. Broadway
Midtown Center, 5700 W. Capitol Dr.
Zablocki Library, 3501 W. Oklahoma Ave.
Monday-Friday from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Saturday-Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Bay View Library, 2566 S. Kinnickinnic Ave.
Cannon Park Pavilion, 303 N. 95th St.
Clinton Rose Senior Center, 3045 N. MLK Dr.
East Library, 2320 N. Cramer St.
Good Hope Library, 7717 W. Good Hope Rd.
Mitchell Street Library, 906 W. Historic Mitchell St.
Tippecanoe Library, 3912 S. Howell Ave.
Villard Square Library, 5190 N. 35th St.
Washington Park Library, 2121 N. Sherman Blvd.
Monday-Tuesday from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m., Wednesday-Friday from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m. and Saturday-Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Milwaukee Area Technical College, 700 W. State St., T Building
Available Wednesday, Oct. 21 – Saturday, Oct. 31
Monday-Saturday from 11a.m. to 2 p.m.

UWM Student Union, 2200 E. Kenwood Blvd.
Monday-Friday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

NOTE: This press release was submitted to Urban Milwaukee and was not written by an Urban Milwaukee writer. It has not been verified for its accuracy or completeness.