While sitting here in the dark this evening, my insomnia a constant companion, I was contemplating the voter suppression activities in various locations around the country. Here on dKos, we have had many diaries dealing with this issue; many have included pictures showing the extremely long lines that many have had to encounter. So I started wondering if there was a way to quantify the effect of the voter suppression tactics. Was there a metric we could use to hammer home the disproportionate events in the voter suppression states? Maybe we could use that information in the future when the governor, secretary of state, election clerk, etc. races occur in the next midterms. Real data and real numbers aren't popular in a lot of political discourse, but they are necessary for really understanding problems.
First I have to say that I am not an election expert like many dKos folks. The limits of my election activities are donations, canvassing and calling. I'm uncomfortable even doing two of those things, but I do them when I can because it's important. I also do not vote "in person" at all. I vote absentee always for reasons that will go unstated. I mention these as precursor because I want to emphasize that my awareness of the polling stations is strictly abstract.
Having now listed some of my (significant) limitations, I found myself wondering about the information available regarding 1) the number of voting machines per polling station, 2) the number of voters expected to go through each polling station, 3) the expected time it takes to complete a single ballot (I know that varies from location to location), and 4) the time required to process a voter prior to using the voting machine. Is this information available in any way (especially the first two)? Is there an easy way to glean this information from the various secretary of state websites (I went to mine, and I couldn't find the information)?
What I'm thinking is that a couple of metrics could be developed that show the variations from location to location. These metrics could then be used to match the difficulty factors versus the voting outcomes, and have a more solid argument regarding future efforts to address the suppression issue. As an example, Site A: Democratic leaning site has 2 machines/100,000 people whereas Site B: Republican leaning has 5 machines for 400 people. (Obviously I'm exaggerating . . . I hope). All one would need initially is the number of machines per site and the number of voters per site.
Anyway, I don't know if that information is available. If it isn't, we (those on the side of the suppressed) could get the numbers to push back and try to make sure that they (those who seek to suppress) don't get to do it again.