Relates to requests for cancellation of the designation of a polling place; provides that the board or agency controlling a designated polling place may file a written request for a cancellation of such designation where there has been a security concern in such building and that such building does not possess the proper structure or procedures to keep the public safe in the event of a security concern arising during the use of such building as a polling site.
STATE OF NEW YORK
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9155
IN SENATE
August 29, 2018
___________
Introduced by Sen. PHILLIPS -- read twice and ordered printed, and when
printed to be committed to the Committee on Rules
AN ACT to amend the election law, in relation to requests for cancella-
tion of the designation of a polling place
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. Subdivision 3 of section 4-104 of the election law, as
2 amended by chapter 694 of the laws of 1989, is amended to read as
3 follows:
4 3. (a) A building exempt from taxation shall be used whenever possible
5 as a polling place if it is situated in the same or a contiguous
6 election district, and may contain as many distinctly separate polling
7 places as public convenience may require. The expense, if any, inci-
8 dental to its use, shall be paid like the expense of other places of
9 registration and voting. If a board or body empowered to designate poll-
10 ing places chooses a public school building for such purpose, the board
11 or agency which controls such building must make available a room or
12 rooms in such building which are suitable for registration and voting
13 and which are as close as possible to a convenient entrance to such
14 building and must make available any such room or rooms which the board
15 or body designating such building determines are accessible to phys-
16 ically disabled voters as provided in subdivision one-a of this section.
17 Not later than twenty days after a public school building receives
18 notice of its designation as a polling place, the board or agency
19 controlling such building may file a written request for a cancellation
20 of such designation, provided that such board or agency makes a showing
21 that such building does not possess the proper structure or procedures
22 to keep the public safe in the event of a security concern arising
23 during the use of such building as a polling site. The board or body
24 empowered to so designate shall, within twenty days after such request
25 is filed, cancel the designation of such polling site.
26 (b) Notwithstanding the provisions of any general, special or local
27 law, if a board or body empowered to designate polling places chooses a
28 publicly owned or leased building, other than a public school building,
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD15835-03-8
S. 9155 2
1 for such purposes the board or body which controls such building must
2 make available a room or rooms in such building which are suitable for
3 registration and voting and which are as close as possible to a conven-
4 ient entrance to such building, and must make available any such room or
5 rooms which the board or body designating such building determines are
6 accessible to physically disabled voters unless, not later than thirty
7 days after notice of its designation as a polling place, the board or
8 body controlling such building, files a written request for a cancella-
9 tion of such designation with the board or body empowered to designate
10 polling places on such form as shall be provided by the board or body
11 making such designation. The board or body empowered to so designate
12 shall, within twenty days after such request is filed, determine whether
13 the use of such building as a polling place would unreasonably interfere
14 with the usual activities conducted in such building and upon such
15 determination, may cancel such designation.
16 § 2. This act shall take effect on the sixtieth day after it shall
17 have become a law.