A sign at the corner of Lafayette Street and Highland Avenue directs voters towards a polling location inside Central United Methodist Church Tuesday morning.
Photo: Todd Gill, Flyer staff
It’s Election Day, folks, and if you haven’t done so already, it’s time to get your vote on.
Today’s election will decide the winners of the preferential primaries, nonpartisan judicial general elections, and the fate of a proposed sales tax to fund public transit.
If you aren’t sure where to vote, head over to Arkansas’ Voter View website and enter your name and date of birth to see a sample ballot for your district, and to find your voting location.
Don’t forget that Arkansas Code 7-1-102 requires that your employer “must create schedules so that each employee will have the opportunity to vote.”
Polls will be open from 7:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m., and you will be asked to present a photo identification at the polls.
Go America!!!!
Voter View website link is helpful, in the story above, thanks for that. Wish I had known that site a bit earlier to look over. I found a sample ballot on Washington County website, however, it was incomplete for some of the races that appeared on my actual ballot.
I voted, got the sticker, and put a pic on Instagram (Vote Here Tuesday, not unlike the Flyer’s picture in this post).
This is a very important election. Residents of Washington County have the opportunity to vote YES for the Transit Initiative. This measure will add 39 new buses and 38 new routes with service in Fayetteville, Springdale, Johnson, Lowell, Goshen, Lincoln, West Fork and more. Paratransit service will be expanded (that’s a ride from any address by appointment, especially helpful for the elderly and people with disabilities). Overall hours will be expanded to 6:00am to midnight, with service 7 days a week.
Expanded transit gives:
- People a reliable, cost-effective way to get to work
- Veterans, seniors, and people with disabilities access to medical and social services and community engagement
- Less traffic and congestion
- Washington County a competitive edge over Benton County in attracting industry and investment.
Vote YES for Transit!
That should read 28 new routes, not 38 (sorry!)
Also, for more information, go to http://www.transit.org.
Probably not going to pass. We have enough taxes in Fayetteville.
Probably going to pass. We don’t have enough public transit in Fayetteville.
The transit tax will die the death to which it is entitled. You’re asking all of Washington County to say “Yes” to an entity that 80% never sees in their own neighborhood.
How about you start with raising prices/instituting prices for transit to determine demand and go from there? Oh wait, that’s too hard, let’s just suck up to the Quorum Court and get them to do our dirty work.
In short, death to the transit tax. YES to an East-West connector in Fayetteville.
How ’bout we charge drivers what roads actually cost? Prepare to have to finally pay your own way.
Even The American Conservative recognizes the waste that is the automobile infrastructure. Even Pat Buchanan’s group is smart enough to support mass transit. http://www.theamericanconservative.com/cpt/
Looks like the people have spoken; perhaps a tax rate approaching 10% is just too much of a cross to bear in a town that actively chases off businesses.
P.S. I pay plenty of taxes to support the current road infrastructure, through gasoline taxes, property assessments, etc etc etc. The fact that the current tax structure is inefficient doesn’t dictate that a public transport system is the only way to go. Plenty of us have more than one place to go during the day throughout NWA that makes a bus system inefficient, especially when it is funded on the backs of my salary (which is pay as somebody else goes, FYI). Sorry you lost? U mad bro? etc…
Definitely being obnoxious is a good way to build support for your point of view.
Mad? I wish the tax vote had passed, but why would I be mad about a public vote of this nature? Besides, I made the wise choice to live close enough to my office that I can walk to work. My pro vote on the tax was for those that would benefit from bus service, such as the elderly and the handicapped. But hey, I’ll stomp my feet and pout if that’ll make ya feel better.
I guess I am not surprised that this didn’t pass as a Washington County vote. I can’t imagine many people voted yes outside of Fayetteville, and I suspect things would be different if it was Fayetteville specific. I can’t find the right words to express my disappointment. Better public transportation truly is a need for our city. I don’t care if you want to drive your own car a mile to work and back. Better public transit is a community need the same way public schools are. smh
I am amused by the attempts of the Washington County Tea Party in trying to claim the defeat as some kind of Teabagger victory. Of course I would have been even more amused to see the– what, hundred or so?– Washington County Teabaggers’ heads explode, had the tax passed.
David, you have a lot of hate.
Explain.
It means you disagree with them. That’s hateful.
It will be interesting to see if the $400 million dollar road tax proposed by the regional planning authority will pass in the general election. Compared to that, the $7 million for transit is a drop in the bucket.
Building transit is a much more fiscally conservative approach than building more roads. According to a recent study of NWA by the Center for Neighborhood Technology, we are now spending more on transportation (29%) than we are on housing (26%). With housing and transportation expenses combined eating up more than 55% of the average household budget, families are hurting which in turn is squeezing revenue out of our local economy. For every dollar spent on gas, 97 cents leaves our local economy. When gas hits $4 a gallon, regional spending on fuel is estimated to be $500 million. We might as well just build a giant funnel and pour $485 million dollars out of our community.
Poor transportation planning and short-sighted policies are hurting our region and our wallets. They are trapping people in poverty and the endless cycle of needing a job to buy and maintain a car and needing a reliable car to have a job. We may have lost this battle, but I’m committed to keep fighting for better transit, sidewalks, trails, and smart planning strategies. Who’s with me?
Sarah Marsh
Candidate for Fayetteville City Council, Ward 1, Position 2
Streets yes, trails should come after that. Let’s fix our existing infrastructure and if we have any left over we can do new sidewalks and trails with that.
No, it seems that you do not like folks who are in the tea party movement. Teabaggers is a very derogatory term used to define a sexual act. Also you said that you would amused to see their heads explode if the tax passed. Even if I did agree with you, it’s not right to talk about folks like that just because they think differently than you.
RE “No, it seems that you do not like folks who are in the tea party movement.”
I do indeed dislike the TEA Party movement, but that does not mean that I “have a lot of hate”, as dislike is not hate. Dislike is rational; hate is not. Given their dishonesty in pretending to be a grassroots movement, the complete sham that is their raison d’etre– our taxes were at a sixty-year low when the Koch brothers invented the movement– and the direct relationship between their ignorance and their loudness, I have good reason to dislike Teabaggers. You are, of course, welcome to present reasons for tolerating, liking, or even admiring a bunch if misinformed political troglodytes; I assure you that I will give your reasons the consideration they deserve.
RE “Teabaggers is a very derogatory term used to define a sexual act.”
“Teabagger” was a term first used by the TEA Party itself. I continue to use it in order to honor their misbegotten origins. Note that I capitalize it in such cases so as to differentiate them from other types of teabaggers. (Not that the other use of “teabagger” is derogatory. The word is a perfectly appropriate and descriptive word for a particular behavior that some people enjoy, and which is entirely different from obliterating political discourse. If you don’t want to be called a “teabagger” (lower-case), don’t teabag. Very simple, really.)
RE “Also you said that you would amused to see their heads explode if the tax passed.”
Do you think that Teabagger heads would literally have exploded if the tax had passed. I don’t. It’s a metaphor.
RE “it’s not right to talk about folks like that just because they think differently than you.”
I don’t talk about Teabaggers that way because they think differently than I do: I talk about them as I do because they don’t think at all. They have hijacked the government with no care for the consequences; they have appropriated the Constitution without understanding it; they have adopted a corporate agenda as if it were in their best interests, with no regard for anybody living in the real world.
Here’s a video showing the impressive command of the Constitution shown by the avant-garde of Teabaggery, as they protested in front of the Supreme Court building during the Obamacare arguments. Enjoy:
http://crooksandliars.com/karoli/tea-party-vs-constitution-obamacare-edition
I’d like to submit my petition to be a charter member of the David Franks Fan Club.
Is there one? If so, I’d better get a cut from the sales of swag.