Election Notebook Week 8: A visit to the clerk's office, and TIF (again)

This week, we’re taking a last look at the TIF ordinance in Traverse City that we reported on last month. 

But first, we’re checking in on a local election clerk and her office. 

Ronda Robinson, the township clerk in Long Lake township in Grand Traverse County is pretty busy right now.

But she says everything’s going well with early voting and getting ready for Election Day. 

Did you know... you were invited to watch your election clerk test vote counting machines?

Robinson told IPR about a process called "public accuracy testing," a part of the election a lot of people don’t know much about.

It’s how election clerks test that vote tabulators are processing ballots correctly before the election. 

Ballots filled out correctly and incorrectly get fed into the machine.

"They're marked every which way. Some are left blank. Some have squiggles on them. Some are overvoted. There's every combination."

Then, they make sure the machines pick up the errors.

And — here’s the best part — the public’s invited to come watch. But Robinson said no one came this year. 

"We have a lot of people that have some concerns about the tabulators. And we always say, come to the test. Come be part of the process. Come see it with your own eyes," she said. "We would like people to be here."

Robinson also said she’s been told to expect a lot of poll watchers and poll challengers this year – those are observers on behalf of the parties. But she’s not too worried about that. 

"A lot of the time they challenge or poll watch, and at the end of the day, they're like, that's, everything's done so well, can I work elections?" she told IPR. "And they end up being [poll] workers."

That’s from her 20 years of working in the clerk’s office. 

When voters within Traverse City show up to their polling place, they’ll be asked to vote about tax increment financing. It's confusing.

We reported on this back in September, but we're getting questions from neighbors and Traverse City listeners about what the tax increment financing (TIF) proposals 1 and 2 actually mean. 

TIF, as a reminder, is a way the city captures tax revenue from certain areas, and invests it in development projects. 

Proposition 2 addresses something called TIF 97, which is the TIF district created in 1997. It expires in 2027.

It funds the Downtown Development Authority (DDA).

Some believe that enough money has gone to developing downtown, and that they weren’t spending money wisely — for example, on parking lots.

Fred Bimber, who’s been organizing for these proposals and against TIF, told IPR back in September that "the DDA wanted to build a third parking deck where, if you looked at it, you could see that it's three blocks from an existing parking deck that's 80% vacant."

This proposal would require any extension of TIF 97 to be put up for a vote on another ballot later down the line. 

That's Proposal 2. What about Proposal 1?

It’s far more broad than just the DDA. Proposal 1 says any TIF project would have to be voted on. 

That includes brownfield TIF projects. Those are TIF projects on contaminated, blighted, or abandoned properties. The money can be spent on housing, which is big for increasing the area’s housing stock. 

Those projects can have nothing to do with downtown. Grand Traverse Commons used brownfield TIF dollars, for example.

Yarrow Brown, executive director of Housing North, a housing advocacy organization based in Traverse City, has been recruiting volunteers to canvas against these proposals. 

She told me she considers TIF one of the most effective tools for moving the needle on housing.

"It will cost an incredible amount of resources to put projects on a ballot every time there were to be a project."

She said brownfield TIF money helps repurpose existing properties into housing, usually at affordable price points — creating new homes using otherwise wasted space. 

A couple notes before Election Tuesday:

BATA is offering free rides to the polls. Buses on the city loop schedule run from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m and the village loop service runs from 6:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m.

Looking ahead to election night itself, we might not get election results, especially for the presidential election, on the night of Nov. 5. If it’s a close race, it will take time to verify the preliminary results that come in from the townships.

So: We’ve told you all about various contests and issues here on the Election Notebook. Now what?

Join IPR for live Election Night coverage starting at 7 p.m. on Nov. 5. The next morning, we’ll fill up “Morning Edition” with local results and reactions to them, from 7 to 9 a.m. on Nov. 6.

And all along the way, we’ll bring you accurate, verified reporting about what’s going on. We’ll be here with you to see how it all shakes out.