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  (Pennsylvania) rejects call for voter ID delay
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ContributorScott³ 
Last EditedScott³  Jul 09, 2012 03:16pm
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News DateMonday, July 9, 2012 09:00:00 PM UTC0:0
Description"Six organizations urged Gov. Tom Corbett to ask state lawmakers to delay implementation of Pennsylvania’s new voter ID law, but a state spokesman rejected the request.

The groups — the Committee of Seventy, the Advancement Project and the Pennsylvania chapters of Common Cause, the League of Women Voters and the American Civil Liberties Union as well as the Philadelphia AFL-CIO — cited the state’s announcement last week that more than 758,000 of the 8.2 million registered voters in the commonwealth lack the most commonly used photo ID cards provided by PennDOT. The law requires that people show photo identification when they go to the polls beginning in November.

Annette Shimer, vice president of the League of Women Voters of Greater Pittsburgh, estimated at least 75,000 of the 758,000 voters without photo IDs live in Allegheny County. Her organization and others in the area are participating in educational seminars on Thursday and July 23 about the law and how to help people get acceptable identification.

“The organization as a whole, both at the state and local levels, has been actively involved in understanding the law, understanding the ramifications of the law, understanding exactly what’s necessary for people to get a photo ID, all the ins and outs of it,” Shimer said. “I’d like to be able to figure out who these people are and how we can reach them.”

Barry Kauffman, executive director of Common Cause Pennsylvania, said he was concerned that state lawmakers who passed the voter ID law in March relied upon inaccurate information that 99 percent of voters had the necessary ID, only to find that 9.2 percent of voters lack PennDOT driver’s licenses or non-driver photo ID cards."
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