Waiting in line to vote
I wrote yesterday about registering to vote, and have been bird dogging local preparations for the Nov. 4 elections.
There seems to be a consensus that the single best measure for whether local elections officials have fulfilled their responsibilities to plan and staff and supply polling places is the whether voters move through the process with reasonable dispatch or must endure long, slow moving lines.
There are no excuses for long lines or long waits. Their presence is proof positive of poor planning or worse: indifference or antagonism to fair elections.
Check out this clip from the award winning documentary film Election Day, filmed in part right here in St. Louis.
The documentary is being aired on PBS as part of its POV series, but also is being live streamed and can be seen in its entirely online through the month of July.
Definitely worth a watch.
(Pictured: Full house and out the door at this polling place during pre-dawn action in 2000. The location is the fire house at 511 Jungs Station Rd, St. Charles. PHOTO BY LARRY WILLIAMS)
Eddie Roth writes about education, social justice, public safety, transportation, legal affairs and historic preservation. He joined the Post-Dispatch editorial page in 2008 after six years as an editorial writer with the Dayton Daily News. But he is not new to St. Louis. Eddie grew up in Webster Groves and south St. Louis County. He's a lawyer who for many years practiced with a downtown firm, and was active in civic affairs, including serving a term on the St. Louis Police Board. He and his wife, Jeanne, and their three daughters, Emily, Julia and Alice, live in the Shaw Neighborhood.
When it comes to community organizing, he endorses Quentin Crisp's advice: Rather than keeping up with the Joneses, it's better to pull them down to your level. 
