McComb Mayor Whitney Rawlings broke a 3-3 tie vote last week to reduce municipal voting precincts to one location per ward.
Selectmen Tammy Witherspoon, Andranette Jordan and Melvin Joe Johnson opposed moving the precincts without comment on Tuesday, while selectmen Ted Tullos, Michael Cameron and Tommy McKenzie voted in favor of moving them.
Explaining his vote, Tullos said this morning, “It makes it easier on poll workers and the people that bring in the (voting) machines. That is what we were trying to do — make it easier on everyone.”
Rawlings said today that redrawing ward lines made the wards more compact, allowing the city to cut confusion and have only one polling place per ward.
“We are giving our voters one voting precinct per ward,” he said when he broke the tie vote.
Rawlings noted that the only major difference is in Ward 4, which Johnson represents. It used to have two polling places, one at the McComb Housing Authority and the other at Joe’s Tractor Co.
Rawlings said Joe’s Tractor Co. has closed and can no longer be a polling place , and under redistricting, the McComb Housing Authority has been moved out of Ward 4.
The board decided to make Lifepoint Church of the Nazarene on Presley Boulevard the new Ward 4 polling place. Rawlings said the church is the geographic center of the ward.
Ward 2 used to have three polling places — the American Legion Hut on Lakeshore Drive, Storehouse Church on Minnesota Avenue and Community Parks Apartments on Middleton Avenue. Rawlings said those have been boiled down to one precinct, Storehouse Church.
Ward 5 used to have polling stations at the Martin Luther King Center and the Alpha Center in Baertown, which has been redistricted out of the ward. Voters will now cast ballots at the Martin Luther King Center only.
There will be no change in precincts for voters in Ward 1, whose single precinct will remain the National Guard Armory at 319 West St.; or in Ward 3, where voting will remain at New Hope Baptist Church, 515 Locust St.
The next city elections will be in June 2014, six months earlier than usual, after city officials voted to reduce their own terms by six months. They said that would cut down on confusion caused by city primaries that have been one day before the November congressional election.
City officials said the precinct changes do not need U.S. justice Department approval.
In other business the board:
• Approved paying True North Emergency Management and Crowder Gulf LLP, $40,055 for monitoring and $169,965 for clean-up of debris from Hurricane Isaac.
• Awarded a $178,859 contract to Stewart Environmental Construction for work on Field 4 at the McComb Sports Park.
• Approved paying $25,000 to the Southwest Mississippi Narcotics Enforcement Unit and $10,400 to the McComb-Pike County Airport Board as part of annual obligations to both agencies. The board also approved paying $3,358 in matching funds to the McComb-Pike County Airport in Fernwood for repairs to the taxiway and apron.
• Approved paying Neel-Schaffer $5,793 for construction engineer services and an estimate for the overlay on South Locust Street.
• Renewed a $1,937 contract with Otis Elevator Co. for City Hall.
• Accepted a $270,900 bid from Mayrant & Associates for renovations to Fire Station No. 1 on Third Street.
• Approved a $14,648 payment to the Pike County Sheriff’s Department for housing city inmates in September.
• Renewed a $192,960 liability insurance contract through the Mississippi Municipal Liability Plan.
• Approved a $90 payment to the Jerry Lyons Agency for liability insurance coverage for local exercise programs.
•Agreed to advertise for bids to paint the water tank at Ninth and 21st streets.
• Accepted $48,000 in funding from the Department of Homeland Security to cover firefighter training.
• Approved bid specifications for operation of the wastewater treatment plant because the city’s contract with Severn Trent expires in 2013.
• Approved giving abandoned bicycles collected by the police department to a non-profit organization.
• Approved travel expenses for Rawlings’ attendance of the MML Youth Planning Meeting in Hattiesburg and the 11th annual Mississippi Economic Council Hob Nob, both in October.
• Approved travel expenses for Carol Rawlings, who attended the Mayor’s Youth Council leadership meeting in Brandon, held on Oct. 25.
• Approved travel for the board to attended the municipal league’s mid-winter conference in Jackson in January and the its summer conference in Biloxi next summer.
• Approved the travel for the Mayor’s Youth Council to attend the Statewide Youth Leadership Summit in Hattiesburg in March and the MML Summer Conference.
