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Fewer than 5,000 Philadelphians have received free voter IDs
With all the advocacy efforts by numerous civil rights and community organizing groups around the voter ID law — and despite a frankly lame and only recently breaking public-information campaign by the state inciting would-be voters to "Show It" — you'd think that tens of thousands of voters would have taken themselves down to Department of Transportation (PennDOT) to get the free ID cards they'll be required to display on election day this year.
Fewer than 5,000 Philadelphians have received free voter IDs
With all the advocacy efforts by numerous civil rights and community organizing groups around the voter ID law — and despite a frankly lame and only recently breaking public-information campaign by the state inciting would-be voters to "Show It" — you'd think that tens of thousands of voters would have taken themselves down to Department of Transportation (PennDOT) to get the free ID cards they'll be required to display on election day this year.
But according to PennDOT, just over 10,000 free licenses — including PennDOT non-driver IDs and Department of State (DOS) IDs that were introduced in August as an alternative — were distributed statewide as of Sept. 20. In Philadelphia, there were 3,878 PennDOT IDs and 642 Department of State IDs distributed.
Whether that's a sign that people have the IDs after all, that word isn't getting out sufficiently, that they can't be bothered to go get them or that they're actually having difficulty obtaining the IDs is hard to say. The state, looking to avoid an injunction against the law, yesterday announced that it will make obtaining the IDs easier still. However the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center, which sent out observers to the PennDOT centers across the state this month, reports that imperfect information may be a problem.
"We found that the sites had almost no information about the DOS ID. Basic signage and information about the law are still not available at every PennDOT licensing center, although coverage has improved considerably since July. While PennDOT centers had virtually no information about the DOS ID, there are multiple documents that reiterate strict documentation requirements for a photo ID, which can only serve to confuse less-informed voters. Through interviews, observers found that in some cases that PennDOT staff were steering voters away from the DOS ID and encouraging them to obtain a PennDOT ID instead.
"In almost 50% of cases, observers received inaccurate of incomplete information. In several cases, staff made reference to documentation that is not required for a DOS ID. Not all staff made it clear that a PennDOT ID could be obtained for free if it was being sought for voting purposes. And even though PennDOT updated the main form required to obtain a non-driver’s photo ID to make it clear that there is no charge for a PennDOT ID, observers found that in most cases the forms they received were not current."
Also not all that informative: The "If you want to vote show it" mailers being delivered to mailboxes statewide this week — which list acceptable forms of ID but don't go the extra step of listing IDs that won't be accepted, such as out-of-state driver's licenses or college IDs without expiration dates.
Still, the number of people who would be affected (if the law isn't subjected to an injunction before November), remains a subject for debate. Keith W. Reeves, director of the Center for Social and Policy Studies at Swarthmore College, released a report based on an exit poll of Philly voters at this April's primary elections. It found that 4 percent of voters didn't have required ID.
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