McMinnville officials were hesitant to place restrictions on the freedoms of city property rights voters. 

The Board of Mayor and Aldermen met Tuesday and was asked to consider passing an ordinance that would require all its property rights voters to vote only by absentee mail-in ballot.

“The major reason is that it will make it a lot cleaner,” said election administrator Susie Davenport. “Currently, if you are a property rights voter in the city of McMinnville, you will have to vote two separate items on your voting sheet when you come to property rights vote. We have to separate that number whenever you come to early voting.”

A property rights voter is: one who does not live in the city, but votes in a city election due to the ownership of real property in the city; is allowed by City Charter; and must register specifically as a property rights voters.

No longer allowing those individuals to vote in person, during the early voting period or on Election Day, would also reduce the cost. 

“We have to have a separate computer system set up for the property rights voters,” said Davenport. “Whenever we have the early voting satellites (locations other than the Early Voting Room at Warren County Administrative Offices), we have to have separate computer systems set up there for property rights voters. They cannot be in the same system as the regular residential voters are listed in. They have to be separate. So, there is an expense there.”

Davenport says those voters, of which there are 174, would be notified by mail of the change. 

“I already mail a letter to all property rights voters before the Municipal Election letting them know that this election is coming up, do you still on the property, etc. I also go through the property data base and make sure this person has this property, that their names are on it and what have you. I would simply send them, with that letter, an application for the absentee ballot,” she said. 

All towns and cities in Warren County must approve the change or it cannot be instituted. Davenport says the towns of Centertown and Viola are in the process of approval, while Morrison is slated to consider the measure next week.

Alderman Stacey Harvey said he contacted the Municipal Technical Advisory Service for its legal advice.

“According to MTAS, and maybe this has changed, it says that the aldermanic charter does not provide for that,” said Harvey. “I can cite the section and verse. Mr. [Tim] Pirtle, has our charter been amended to where it’s permissible to have property rights voting? According to MTAS, it’s illegal. The aldermanic charter does not allow it. That’s an opinion from MTAS.”

Pirtle replied, “I can’t give you an answer to without doing some research. You can’t pass the ordinance tonight because of the Sunshine Law. That gives us two weeks. I’ll take a deep dive and make sure you are on solid ground if you elect to go this route. You cannot consider an ordinance until the next meeting, which is two weeks away. That would give me plenty of time to answer your question, and I’ll answer to the whole board. You can consider this at the next meeting, if you are so inclined.”

Harvey may have misunderstood the intent of Davenport’s request, as well as a measure adopted by Warren County government recently, as evident by his next comment. 

“I find it interesting that the county will not allow you to speak if you own property in the county, but don’t reside in the county,” said Harvey. “Here in the city, we’re entertaining allowing voting rights for non-resident people. You can’t even speak at a meeting over there at the county seat, and we have a county official in here trying to get us to giving voting rights to nonresidents.”

As explained by Pirtle, non-resident voting rights for McMinnville property owners already exist and “have existed for a long, long time.”

Warren County government’s public comment rules do allow Warren County property owners to speak, even if they do not live in within the county.

In June, the Warren County Commission unanimously voted to update its public comment rules. Commissioners increased the speaking time from two minutes to three minutes. They also added that there shall be no more than two speakers on any single subject matter. All speakers must be a resident of or own property in Warren County. 

Davenport’s request was tabled by McMinnville Board of Mayor and Aldermen and will be re-considered on Tuesday, Aug. 9.