Don’t want to be Wisconsin? Me, either. Click here to download your Alaska Absentee Ballot Application. It’s one page plus one page of instructions.

That one page of instructions is everything you need to know about voting by mail in chatty, easily understood language. (Also available on the website.)

The website says right up top:

Anyone may request a ballot by mail. You do not need a reason!

First up on the form, you can choose which elections you want to vote by mail in:

I’m choosing “All in Calendar Year.” My application goes in the mail tomorrow morning.

This is a hard call for me. I was taught by example how important my vote is. My mother took me into the voting booth in Seldovia with her on election day before I could even see over the edge of the table. Later when I went to college in Anchorage, I registered at the church where my dad voted. The election ladies got to know us and would call down the hall as I walked toward them, “You beat your dad in!” or “You just missed your dad, he said to say hi!”

I vote as much to honor my parents as I do to have a voice in my community. In the 2018 election there was an actual line at the Homer Chamber of Commerce and we applauded a young woman who cast her first vote. My mom and dad would have loved that.

I’m really going to miss those things, but Covid-19 is going to be with us for years. I don’t want to catch it. Even more I don’t want to give it to anyone else, and I don’t think it’s fair to put election workers at risk, either.

Nor am I willing to give up my voice in the affairs of my community.
I don’t have to. In Alaska I can vote by mail. See you at the post office.

Chatter Uncategorized vote by mail