Grant Helps Handicapped Voters | Community Spirit

New grant money will help make sure all eleigible Minnesotans are able to vote.

A $400,000 federal grant will be used to make all polling places handicap accessible.

The Secretary of State Office is now accepting applications for these grants.

Many townships and counties are now looking at where the changes need to be made.

In Olmsted County they expect most of the money to go to rural areas and small townships.

"Right now all of our precincts are handicap accessible. With the redistricting coming up that's one of the first things we look for when we have to look for new locations for precincts. We use a lot of schools. We use a lot churches," Olmsted County Clerk Judy Scherr says.

Over the next few months, county officials will work to redistrict and assign new polling places.

With such a large population growth over the past 10 years, they expect many locations will change.