Small changes to voter registration chip away voting access
Mark Niesse’s article, “Automatic Registration Restored in GA” (News, April 29), illustrates how seemingly small changes to voter registration and voting can drastically affect voting numbers.
Changing the default on driver’s license renewals from opting-in to register or update voter information to a default opting-out resulted in a 48% drop in voter registrations and a 51% drop in address updates when renewing/obtaining a driver’s license.
That single change possibly affected thousands of Georgians. Additionally, the signing of SB 202 has successfully served to make voting more difficult for many Georgians. Other Republican states are enacting similar laws.
Georgia citizens may no longer distribute water at the polls or carpool to vote, but candidates are free to lie about voter fraud ad nauseam.
The cumulative effect of chipping away at voting access will certainly answer whether we are able to keep our republic.
SKIP WEILAND, MARIETTA
VA hospital management incompetent, but doctors do care
I have been a patient at the VA hospital in Decatur for 30 years. There is not much in incompetence that I have not seen. The only people who have the veterans in mind are, in most cases, the doctors. They care about you, listen to you, and do not rush you out of their offices like doctors in private practice often do.
The incompetence is in management, and some employees need to be shown the door. While waiting in line to get breakfast, standing with a cane, I was knocked over by employees running late to work. Did the employee pick me up or apologize? Not quite! It was other patients. I cannot get up without assistance if fallen. The rudeness of employees is commonplace.
There is too much “skylarking” (a Navy term for playing around) in the passageways and too many sexual suggestions among employees. This letter would be a thousand lines long if I were to mention half of what I have seen or heard.
RALEIGH C. PERRY, BUFORD
