Letters: Improve voting accessibility

This election will be not be "rigged," as Donald Trump claims, but there is an area where the states can make the process more open and fair - by making polling places more accessible for voters with disabilities.

A Rutgers University study found that the voter turnout for people with disabilities in 2012 was 5.7 percentage points lower than for people without disabilities, in large part because of barriers to access to the polling place and the lack of assistance from election officials. Pennsylvania had a difference of 7.7 percentage points.

State officials can help eliminate that gap this year by providing accessible parking and entrances to the polling place, avoiding long lines and excessive wait times without chairs, providing clear directions to accessible entrances and elevators, and avoiding narrow doorways and doors that are difficult to open. In addition, there should be helpful, cooperative election officials inside the polling place who help arrange for assistance with voting machines and paper ballots.

|Edward Correia, cochair, Public Policy Committee, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, Bethesda, Md., ecorreia@correiadc.com