Voting in Pennsylvania (November 2024) - Nonpartisan Information and Resources

Voting in Pennsylvania (November 2024) - You're Welcome.

To avoid this article being like an online recipe blog, I'm putting the resources on top and my thoughts on the bottom. You probably don't want to know how my Nonna used to bring me to the voting booth every year during a beautiful brisk fall day in November. 

(Insert AI Generated Photo of a Nonna and Child at the Polls on a Crisp fall day)

The resources in this article are for the state of Pennsylvania. I encourage you to find information for the County or Municipality level where you live. Those may help you find the information more specific to your situations. I am not a representative of Pennsylvania’s election administration or government or otherwise. I am just a citizen doing my best to be informed. The links in this article are directed to Pennsylvania.gov websites as much as possible. As time passes - Information will change and links will die. I do not make the promise to keep this updated. Although - if you reach out to me with questions - I might be able to assist.


Key Dates:

• The Election is on November 5th - This year includes the presidential election.
• Polls are open on Election Day from 7 AM - 8 PM
• The last day to register to vote is October 21st, 2024
• The Last day to request a mail-in or absentee ballot is October 29th, 2024

4 Questions to get started:

• Where is your polling location?
  
  
• Link to find your polling location in Pennsylvania

• Are you registered to vote?
  
  
• Link to check your voter registration status

• Link to register to vote online

• Will you want or need a Mail-in or Absentee Ballot? Also do you need to contact your county election office?

• Link to download the .pdf version of registration and Mail-in or Absentee Ballot Application
  
  
• Link to County Election Offices - Contact for your Mail-in drop off location

• Beyond the presidential candidates, do you know the State or local candidates who will be on your ballot?

• Link to PA Election Information

• Link to Committee of Seventy has an interactive Voter Guide that might be easier to navigate!
  
  
• Pennsylvania has Accessible Polling Information!

• Link to PA’s Accessible Polling Information

As Promised My thoughts - Why even write this blog?

I hope that you didn't scroll down to this for more Nonna content, because spoiler I do not have a Nonna. 

I do a lot of gathering of information. Every project begins with google and 50 Chrome tabs. This week's project was putting together some resources for local canvassing. This will be my first time and I will be doing it from a nonpartisan standpoint. I don't feel like debating the merits of who my choices will be and I'm happy to admit - I am nervous going out there.

So the resources that are helpful to me may be helpful to someone else searching for it. I sifted through A LOT of resources so hopefully this simplified the most important information for this topic.

There is a possibility this will be a series... stay tuned.

Things I did to make this post accessible

The steps I take to help one person, actually helps everyone!

As I learn to practice what I preach, I'm going to spotlight the steps I'm going to take for every post so that it is accessible to anyone who may come across it. Eventually, I might turn this into a google document and link it at the bottom if it gets too long. It's worth spotlighting periodically though. Please let me know how I can improve!

• I don't underline anything that isn't a link. Screen Readers treat items that are underlined as links.

• I'm using the Header system to organize my blog. This allows those who use screen readers to more easily navigate the article.

• If there is an image, I will include alternative (or "alt) text. I will also indicate if it is a decorative or informative picture so that it can be skipped.

• No emojis as bullet points. Screen readers don't say "Smiley Face" they will read out, "Colon, Right Parenthesis" which would make "reading" an article difficult and confusing.

• Lot's of headings, Bullet points and White Space for ease of navigation and visually scanning.

• Contrast / Saturation - I will endeavor to not use color to indicate important themes on my blog and I will make sure that the colors I do choose have enough contrast to be able to be read.

Disclaimer:  I'm learning, this is the first time in a long time I'm writing a blog.  So please excuse any weird formatting or graphical errors.  My goal is to get my thoughts on paper.  I know that the trend is to make things really "pretty" or very well designed.  Its just not where I am yet! 

Please let me know your opinions and if this information was helpful to you or not.  I think my next post will be my thoughts on why you should vote or not, and a decision making guide on whether or not you should vote... The answer is always yes.  However, sometimes we can be on the fence and that makes it hard.  Hopefully with some discussion I can empower you to make that walk or trip to your local ballot location!