Citing disruption, Richmond School Board will consider no longer allowing voting at schools

On April 21, schools across the region closed to serve as polling sites in a special election on redistricting. Frustration over another lost day of school has Richmond’s School Board considering unlisting its facilities as potential polling places.

“Learning gets impacted because we don’t meet,” said Board member Katie Ricard (2nd District). 

Ricard said that families have reached out to her to ask if it was possible to move voting booths out of schools and into other locations in the city, like churches, nonprofit spaces or the new and improved community centers that the city has put $65 million towards, in order to prevent school closures. 

“It is really disorienting as an RPS parent to suddenly be like, ‘Oh crap, another election, now a special election, who’s working, who’s not working?’” said Ali Faruk (3rd District), who shared that many of the buildings in his district are used as polling places. “It’s a lot to balance.”

The city’s general registrar, currently David Levine, is responsible for identifying voting locations, and City Council is responsible for approving them. The city currently uses 26 of the division’s buildings as polling stations, two of which are vacant – Clark Springs and Albert V. Norrel.

RPS Superintendent Jason Kamras said the registrar requires at least a two-year notice of Richmond school’s request to have their buildings off limits when elections come around, meaning that buildings would still be in use for two years after the Board puts in its request. 

State law is vague, said Matthew Stanley, director of advocacy and outreach, as it requires all voting locations to occur in public buildings. But Stanley said the city has multiple other public buildings that could serve the purpose. 

“We do believe that if the School Board were to request that the registrar and City Council no longer use public school buildings as polling locations, that would be something they would be able to comply with,” Stanley said. He added that if the registrar does run into issues finding another polling location, that could be a future conversation.

The division has also closed its schools this year due to inclement weather. Between last December and January, students were out of school for nearly 10 days due to the snow and ice storm that made it difficult for residents to go anywhere. That resulted in the School Board voting to make the Easter Monday holiday an in-school day to somewhat make up for the school time lost. 

While there was little to no opposition to the idea, Wesley Hedgepeth (4th District) noted that schools are community buildings and elections allow the public to see the buildings. 

“I’m not opposed, I’m just wondering … is that kind of sending a message that we’re closed to the community? I don’t know,” he said. 

Before making any decision, Board Chair Shavonda Fernandez (9th District) recommended that the administration put out a survey to hear from families on the matter. 

“As I think about how we’ve had to make some adjustments … it just causes a lot of undue burden on our families that we haven’t really considered,” she said. 

That survey will likely go out in the upcoming school year, Kamras said, with results presented in late fall. If results show that parents would be in favor of it, the Board could then inform the registrar sometime in 2027. 

Contact Reporter Victoria A. Ifatusin at vifatusin@richmonder.org