The Watauga County Board of Elections has restored several polling sites in Boone. That comes a day after the State Director of Elections indicated she would not approve a plan to combine the three sites into one location.
The three sites include one on the Appalachian State University campus for next year. But the specific location still was a contentious issue. The Republican majority favored a site called Legends an on-campus student nightclub. In a letter to the State Board of Elections, A.S.U. officials urged against that location, citing flooding problems and a lack of air conditioning, and instead offered up a new facility within the student union.
The majority on the Watauga Board of Elections went through with choosing the Legends site anyway, saying it was more accessible to voters on and off-campus. They also had concerned about maintaining a 50-foot electioneering buffer at the Student Union site.
Earlier this week, the State Board of Elections allowed Watauga County to move a one-stop voting site off the Appalachian State campus for this year’s municipal elections only.