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State Board of Elections To Hear Watauga, ASU One-Stop Voting Appeal Today, Live Stream Over

Update: The State Board of Elections voted 4-1 to adopt the early voting plan that Republicans Bill Aceto and Luke Eggers pushed through on Aug. 12. 

No ASU early voting site for the 2013 municipal elections. 

Story to come…

Editor’s Note: While the State Board of Elections meeting featuring the Watauga County Board of Elections starts at 1 p.m., the agenda item featuring Watauga County won’t take place until after the hearing regarding Pasquotank County and an Elizabeth City State University senior who was barred from running from city council. [Live Stream courtesy of WRAL]

By Jesse Wood

Sept. 3, 2013. The State Board of Elections meets today at 1 p.m. in Raleigh to hear, among other items, an appeal of the one-stop plan the Republican-led Watauga County Board of Elections passed on Aug. 12 that eliminated early voting on the campus of Appalachian State University during the November municipal elections. 

Ian O’Keefe, a member of the Watauga County Democratic Party, helped organize rides for folks to “speak up and stand up for the voting rights of Boone residents [because] the local board has gone too far and become too radical,” according to a Facebook post.

On Tuesday – minutes before the State Board of Elections meeting was to begin, O’Keefe said the meeting room was full to capacity “by quite a bit” and people were being moved into an overflow room where they could listen in and possibly watch a video feed of the meeting in progress.

O’Keefe noted that about eight television crews were on site, including producers from “The Rachel Maddow Show,” which initially shined the national spotlight on the Watauga County Board of Elections in numerous episodes.  

While the meeting starts at 1 p.m., it’s likely that the board won’t address the Watauga County Board of Elections’ actions until much later because the first agenda item consists of an appeal of Montravias King of Pasquotank County. King attends Elizabeth City State University and the Pasquotank County Board of Elections barred the senior for running for city council, ruling that his campus address couldn’t be used to establish local residency.

O’Keefe estimated that about 200 people would show up to the meeting and he said that about 50 percent of those in attendance were from Watauga County and the other 50 percent were from Elizabeth City.