Starting Saturday, any registered voter in Sonoma County who has not yet voted by mail can do so as a user at one of the county’s 31 polling places. Each polling place will be open from nine a. m. At five p. m. each and every day of Election Day, when the hours will be extended and the centers will open at 7 a. m. m. y will close at 8 p. m.
A list of all polling place locations is available on the Registrar of Voters website.
Voters may vote as a user at any polling station of their choice. No one is assigned a place of singleness, in 2022.
At a polling place, in addition to voting in person, citizens can drop off surveys by mail, get replacement mail-in surveys, and be with available survey marking devices and language assistance.
The registered electorate can also update their voter form, and citizens who are eligible to vote but missed the Oct. 24 voter registration deadline can complete a voter registration form the same day and vote on-site at one of the polling places. This includes Election Day.
Voters who prefer to vote by mail can return their survey by mail (must be postmarked no later than Election Day and won at the Registrar of Voters workplace no later than Nov. 15) by dropping it off at one of 21 mailboxes located throughout the county or by taking them to a vote center.
For a list and map of all official polling places and ballot boxes in Sonoma County, adding dates and hours of operation, visit sonomacounty. ca. gov/where-to-vote.
For more information, stop by the Sonoma County Registrar of Voters online page in socovotes. com, call 707-565-6800, email rov-info@sonoma-county. org or stop at the Registrar of Voters user at 435 Fiscal Drive, Santa Rosa.
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For all Press Democrat election articles, bit. ly/3heolUd
Sonoma County is a position that no one on the political spectrum can feel those days.
Proud liberals are on the national stage and see potential losses in the U. S. House and Senate, and imminent revenge with former President Donald Trump’s forces.
Meanwhile, hardline conservatives are waging perpetual war against entrenched Democrats at the state and county level.
Even so, the party’s local leaders were quite excited the week before Election Day.
Local Democrats have been busy, sending postcards to contested races elsewhere in the country, making phone calls to California hotspots and going door-to-door in neighboring congressional districts that can pass either way, according to Sonoma’s president. Pat County Democratic Party Sabo. La Proposition 1, which would enshrine a woman’s right to abortion in California, boosts participation, he said.
Sabo’s counterpart, Sonoma County Republican Party Chairman Matt Heath, worries about rising prices of customer goods and how it affects paychecks, most important in polls involving an electoral shift to the right for the midterm elections.
“Americans don’t like to have a party in charge,” Heath said. “That’s what I hope Sonoma County will accomplish. One-party rule is not a smart idea.
On Thursday, turnout was moderate. Sonoma County Recorder’s office, Deva Proto, won 69,836 votes, or 23% of the potential turnout. This was lower than the Thursday before Election Day in November 2018 (33%) and through November 2020 (56%), but much further than the previous Thursday. the number one in June (16%).
These ads are dense. There are seven state proposals, thirteen local ballot measures and 68 county runs, which add applicants for state, federal and county offices, city councils, school districts, and water or chimney districts.
As Election Day approaches, The Press Democrat surveyed the electorate (and one candidate) obsessed with other degrees of government in 2022, to see what motivates them and how they feel about democracy in America. These are their concerns, with the hyperlocal and extending to national politics.
Deborah Tapia’s number one accessory is on the smallest scale. She believes there will be more Spanish-language facilities for students and families in the Rincon Valley school district, where her 4-year-old daughter, Sofia, is enrolled in a fancy pre-K program at Madroñe Elementary.
“I’m volunteering at the school and a lot of the kids I see don’t feel comfortable if they have a problem,” said Tapia de Martin, a local Spanish speaker. “That’s not true. You can have an advisor in your language. “, in your culture, to help you.
The conviction of Tapia de Martín not only sends her to the polls on Tuesday. This prompted her to run for the school district’s board of trustees. New in the process, she summed up her party in one word.
“It’s discouraging,” Tapia said of Martin, 35. “It’s a lot of work. And you have to spend so much money on propaganda. My God, you have to have your committee and make sure you abide by all the rules. And there are plenty of fundraisers if you need to watch the game. It’s very challenging. I don’t need to parade. I just need to help.
The mother of two grew up in Puerto Rico in, as she puts it, “a circle of relatives of strong women,” but spent a lot of time in the Dominican Republic. He also studied in Spain, spent a year in the Czech Republic. , and lived in Boston and Charleston, South Carolina, before moving to Sonoma County.
His experience tells him that, although our electoral formula is complicated, the political frictions shaking the United States are global. But while Tapia de Martin found his school board to be discouraging, his private interactions with the electorate only reaffirmed his faith in democracy.
“It’s been super positive,” Tapia de Martin said. “I did a lot of door-to-door probing, knocking on doors. And individually, only other people who have conversations will see that you do. “There is no such big difference. You may not agree on some things, but not on anything to the point of, you know, “I’ll never sit with you. “
When Leland Fishman looks at Petaluma, where he has lived most of his life, he sees a jewel of a net in a domain that attracts visitors from all over the world. And it knows that it may not remain exceptional unless citizens pay attention to how it works. is developed.
Then Fishman understands why local can be so painful to resolve.
“There’s kind of a universal fact in Petaluma that when you’re a city council member or mayor, you automatically get 50 percent of the population that agrees with you and the 50 percent that disagrees,” he said. 8 years ago, and the mayor got less than 1,000 votes. This tells you how divided the network is. And it’s usually about how other people need the network to grow and how fast.
These are Fishman’s problems.
Specifically, it focuses on the Rainier Crosstown Connector project, which would link McDowell Boulevard with Petaluma Boulevard North via a bridge over Highway 101; and the debate about how the Sonoma-Marin Exhibition Center deserves to be used. Fishman was all in favor of the former, but doubts arose after reading the environmental report. As for the latter, he knows that this is heresy for some. Residents, however, he thinks the exhibition center site would be a smart place for the city corridor and a police and fire station.
These issues are not on the 2022 ballot. But many seats on the Petaluma City Council are, and the winners will help how local projects will develop.
Fishman, 65, is retired after 42 years at the helm of the family-owned Fishman Supply Company, a distributor of commercial materials and maintenance. Elected representatives have good intentions and that their political disagreements are in good faith.
“Change doesn’t mean you lose your identity or what’s costly to you,” Fishman said. “It just means that what you care about adjusts a little bit. “
It’s the state proposals that attract Evans’ attention. A retired social worker and unwavering Democrat, she and her husband, Jim, examine their election guides, scan the flood of mail they receive at their home in Cloverdale and, of course, see what the party recommends. Both have already mailed their ballots for 2022.
Evans, 76, is strongly in favor of Proposition 1, the reproductive rights initiative. And after digging deeper, he opposes the two measures, Proposition 26 and Proposition 27, which would legalize sports betting in California, otherwise.
But this year, it’s about Measure K, that same Cloverdale problem, which she seemed most eager to talk about. Sonoma County Township
Evans applauds the charities of his local Lions Club and understands how much money is raised by annual sales of fireplace paints. But the threat of fires in the parched hills of the county’s northern component is all too great.
“I don’t forget how close the chimneys were to us in 2017,” Evans said. “We stood on the street and saw smoke coming out of Geyserville. Without the luck of the winds, this chimney could have endangered Cloverdale. . . Do we need a conflagration before we act?
Evans admits it’s a tough sell in one of Sonoma County’s most rustic and classic locations.
“Our city council, well, I wouldn’t need their jobs,” Evans said. “I hate to criticize. But they didn’t need to make the decision, so they pushed it toward the voters. We’ll see. “
Amelie Malerba-Locke died in a twist of automobile fate about two years ago, when she was just 18. Soon after, he gave his grandfather the impression in a dream and made an undeniable request: “Tell mom to apply for citizenship. “”
How is it possible that Francesca Malerba-Locke rejects such a call from her daughter?Francesca applied for U. S. citizenship almost immediately. The dream came true Sept. 20 at an oath rite in San Francisco.
Malerba-Locke, 57, grew up in Milan, Italy, but has lived in the United States since 1986 and Sonoma County since 1992. She attracted the United States as a young dancer, partly through the television show “Fame. “She now lives in Sevastopol, where she owns and runs Attico, a consignment furniture store on Sevastopol Avenue. The newly created American is eager to vote for the first time.
One of his interests is opposition to 5G telecom towers, which he says are harmful; she supports Sandra Maurer for the Sevastopol City Council of its environmental positions.
But what occupies Malerba-Locke’s mind the week before Election Day is what she calls “medical choice. “
“My daughter at the time was still alive, and the damage she caused, the mental damage to a teenager, I will never forget,” Malerba-Locke said.
She doesn’t think it was worth it. Companies have suffered. And she’s convinced that COVID vaccines are ineffective, if not downright harmful. He believes state officials like Gov. Gavin Newsom pay the value of those decisions.
Just one problem. When questioned Wednesday, Malerba-Locke finds herself in electoral limbo. He had sent his voter registration to the county, but feared he hadn’t missed the deadline. vote.
“In Italy, that’s the way things are,” Malerba-Locke said. All you have to do is show your ID card and vote. Here, not so much.
Larry Metzger has been voting since the mid-1950s. He knows it will be one of the highest choices of his life.
“Because of my age, I’m a history major,” Metzger said. “I’ve noticed that this country expands from when I was a teenager and 20 years old, until now it’s governed by media that make a lot of money spreading misinformation. It would possibly be a question mark whether democracy survives or passes into autocracy. “
Metzger will turn 90 in two months. She grew up in New Jersey, earned a doctorate in psychology, and practiced for 25 years. He lives independently in an apartment in Oakmont Gardens, a retirement community, and is interested in politics.
Although he insists he doesn’t fall into “a specific portion,” Metzger is drawn to equity issues. He doesn’t like the way young undocumented immigrants known as Dreamers are treated, for example, infantrymen returning from World War II who benefited from the GI bill.
Metzger had his survey when he spoke to The Press Democrat and planned to mail it out.
One proposal caught his attention: Proposition 28, which would increase investment for arts and music in public schools.
“I would do a lot of promotion for that,” Metzger said. When I was a top-notch student, we had a music instructor that you were with every week. We organized a glorious operetta. I don’t know if those things are going down yet.
At Olivia House and her parents’ home, voting is a ritual.
The circle of family members sits around the dining table and looks at the ballot, exchanging opinions about judges, district-level positions, and mandatory measures.
“It takes about two hours and there’s a lot of conversation,” Olivia said.
At age 19, the Santa Rosa local and SRJC student is an active participant. His circle of relatives leans Democratic, House said, but his parents have splashed some Republican votes. This year, they all became completely blue.
It is the polarization of the American electorate, expressed in a single family, and what worries House. He has a beloved aunt and uncle who, well, let’s just say they don’t communicate about politics anymore.
When asked which factor or candidate caught his eye this year, House’s answer was a bit surprising: Proposition 29, an edition of which appears every two years in California. Kidney dialysis clinics deserve to have a doctor, nurse or physician assistant on site all hours of operation. Opponents say this would result in the closure of clinics.
“I see those patients on TV, and then I read about them, and they need to close those clinics. It’s very sad,” he said. I have objected because I need them to remain open. I am disappointed that we have to continue to vote on this factor again and again.
House has already voted. He took the ballots from the total circle of relatives to the post office. Putting the envelopes in the mailbox, he said, was an “amazing experience. “Locate it here.
“It’s such a wonderful delight to vote, because I feel like I’ve taken the next step in my life,” House said. “It’s this freedom that’s small, but it’s so wonderful. “
While some Sonoma County constituents talk about fuel prices, reproductive rights or homelessness, McCuan has less tangible concerns but in some more basic tactics.
The Sonoma state political science professor has long studied election management: “Essentially, how a poll moves,” he said. candidate, that’s a problem.
“This is what I call fake populism,” McCuan said. “It invokes the management of elections and the veracity of the results, which questions the legitimacy of the system. When you question the legitimacy of the process, you replace establishments and replace democracy.
In his classes, McCuan speaks of “political brutality. ” This can be interpreted literally, as the October 28 intrusion into Nancy Pelosi’s home, where a man allegedly decided to harm the speaker of the United States House of Representatives and ended up severely beating her 82-year-old husband, Paul.
But political brutality, McCuan said, also includes the kind of spontaneous arguments that expel other qualified people from U. S. politics, making it difficult for the government apparatus to function.
“The gap has widened and deepened as to whether our most productive days are forward or for us,” McCuan said. “All of this is causing a lot of anxiety for next week. Voters enter this cycle with wonderful anxiety.
This anxiety can be stoked through social media, where, at this exact moment, you are sure to deny virtually any clinical fact or ancient truth. “Other reasonable people now have an ounce or a pound of doubt,” McCuan said.
The last time the U. S. As the U. S. held a primary election in November, the profligate presidential candidate and his most ardent supporters used that doubt to publicize a false narrative of voter fraud. Enough people believed in her to organize a mass insurrection at the U. S. Capitol. The U. S. government, directly or indirectly, resulted in the deaths of nine other people.
With the 2022 vote counting down just days away, election officials in some parts of the country are already embroiled in violence over the results.
“Both sides are fleeing a position of anger and suspicion,” McCuan said. “All of this leads to this crisis of legitimacy. Those of us who live from this are very concerned. Because we didn’t see it that way. There are many in the 60s. But that’s different.
Like Malerba-Locke, Larisa Volzhina is an immigrant and one of the first American voters. Unlike Malerba-Locke, he still has his survey and plans to go through consultation by consultation, candidate by candidate. This is not an easy task to learn a new language after developing in Alzamay, a small town on the Russian territory of Siberia, and arrived in the United States in 2015.
His American son-in-law, and Google Translate, he. Volzhina does not speak English as skillfully as she would like, but her enthusiasm is palpable.
“I feel like I’m a real citizen of this country if I can vote,” she said. When I came to the United States, I didn’t know much. After living here for almost 8 years, I am very satisfied to be a U. S. citizen.
Volzhina, 65, naturalized in February. He lives in Rohnert Park.
He will vote in person, he said, to fully enjoy the experience. Volzhina feels that voting in her new one will mean something very different than the one she grew up in.
“I think here in this country I feel freer,” Volzhina said. “It’s very attractive that I can use a lot of tactics to vote, online, by mail, in person. And it’s not forcibly for me. I think this formula works very well. “Good here.
Phil Barber can be reached at 707-521-5263 or phil. barber@pressdemocrat. com. On Twitter @Skinny_Post.
Starting Saturday, any registered voter in Sonoma County who has not yet voted by mail can do so as a user at one of the county’s 31 polling places. Each polling place will be open from nine a. m. At five p. m. each and every day of Election Day, when the hours will be extended and the centers will open at 7 a. m. m. y will close at 8 p. m.
A list of all polling place locations is available on the Registrar of Voters website.
Voters may vote as a user at any polling station of their choice. No one is assigned a place of singleness, in 2022.
At a polling place, in addition to voting in person, citizens can drop off surveys by mail, get replacement mail-in surveys, and be with available survey marking devices and language assistance.
The registered electorate can also update their voter form, and citizens who are eligible to vote but missed the Oct. 24 voter registration deadline can complete a voter registration form the same day and vote on-site at one of the polling places. This includes Election Day.
Voters who prefer to vote by mail can return their survey by mail (must be postmarked no later than Election Day and won at the Registrar of Voters workplace no later than Nov. 15) by dropping it off at one of 21 mailboxes located throughout the county or by taking them to a vote center.
For a list and map of all official polling places and ballot boxes in Sonoma County, adding dates and hours of operation, visit sonomacounty. ca. gov/where-to-vote.
For more information, stop by the Sonoma County Registrar of Voters online page in socovotes. com, call 707-565-6800, email rov-info@sonoma-county. org or stop at the Registrar of Voters user at 435 Fiscal Drive, Santa Rosa.
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For all Press Democrat election articles, bit. ly/3heolUd
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