By: Terry DeYoung

As someone who has dealt with a significant physical disability my entire life, I don’t like asking for help, even though I sometimes need it. Whether I’m using my cane to knock down a can from a grocery store shelf beyond my reach or going to a polling place to cast my vote, I want to do things for myself as much as possible—without assistance from others, no matter how well-intentioned would-be helpers might be. 

Why do I (and many other disabled people) feel this way?  

For one thing, there’s widespread stigma attached to having a disability. Many people see us as helpless, incapable, having little to offer, or a drain on other people and society. Whenever I ask for help, I risk reinforcing stereotypes that people with disabilities are trying to overcome or negate.  

Asking for help may also invite others to pity me, and I don't want to live my life as someone people feel sorry for. (I also don't want people to feel sorry for my wife for being married to me or think they should praise her for being married to a "needy disabled person"!) I consider myself a gifted person with much to contribute. I want to be valued for who I am as well as what I can offer to a community.  

I live with a rare bone condition that affects every joint in my body—resulting in numerous surgeries and requiring the use of a cane—but I live a full and rewarding life. After paying my share of taxes for 50 years, I retired last year. I concluded the last phase of my career with a 14-year stint as the Reformed Church in America’s disability concerns coordinator. My job was to ensure that people with disabilities could fully participate in our member churches across the United States and Canada. 

In retirement, I’m continuing my efforts to make a difference—in my community at large and in the greater disability community. That includes volunteering for the ACLU of Michigan’s Clerk Engagement Program, which helps ensure that our elections are fair, accurate, and accessible to every eligible voter. Barriers to voting—whether based on discrimination because of one’s ethnicity, race, ability, gender, age—don’t disappear on their own. Awareness and advocacy are essential. 

One way to achieve greater access and reduce discrimination is for state legislators to finalize passage of the Michigan Voting Rights Act (MIVRA) when they return from summer recess. Part of the necessity for doing so is linked to the 2013 federal case Shelby v. Holder, which saw the U.S. Supreme Court gut a significant part of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, widely regarded as the “most successful piece of civil rights legislation ever adopted by the United States Congress.”  

Passing MIVRA will expand on protections previously included in the federal Voting Rights Act, as well as add new protections for all Michigan voters by: 

• Providing additional legal tools to fight discriminatory voting rules in court. 
• Expanding language assistance for voters with limited English proficiency. 
• Ensuring advance public notice of key voting changes so voters can take action. 
• Establishing a central hub for election information to increase transparency and promote best practices. 
• Securing needed safeguards for voters with disabilities by creating a process to identify and resolve alleged violations of state or federal laws protecting their voting rights.  

In regard to that last point, to protect the rights of people with disabilities, MIVRA, when necessary, will allow for the appointment of local accessibility monitors, who can be put in place for up to 10 years if voluntary remedies are not pursued. Accessibility monitors are sorely needed because current laws have often failed to resolve accessibility issues facing Michiganders with disabilities. (More about the need to pass MIVRA and the benefits it will bring all voters can be found here.) 

Because of the much-needed reforms MIVRA will bring, I encourage you to contact your state senator and urge them to pass this important piece of legislation to improve voting access, not just for people with disabilities, but for all Michigan voters. 

What’s Up with VAT? 

Of particular interest to me is improving reliable availability and access to Voter Assist Terminals (VATs). These terminals provide accommodations for people with hearing, visual, physical and other disabilities, providing them the opportunity to independently vote a ballot in privacy. By law, VATs must be available and in working condition at every polling place in Michigan. 

In my experience, these crucial devices have seemed like an afterthought at most polling places. Here are three personal examples from just the past eight years: 

• On one occasion, I asked for the accessible voting option and was told that all the places to mark my ballot were accessible—the poll worker motioning to tables set up with multiple dividers for privacy and chairs. After marking and submitting my ballot, I returned to the sign-in area to ask what happened to the special machine that provided options for someone who was visually impaired or otherwise unable to mark a typical paper ballot. “You mean the VAT? It’s right over there,” the poll worker said, pointing to a corner of the room. “You should have asked to use the VAT.” I explained that it’s unrealistic to expect that someone who asks for an accessible voting option to identify the Voter Assist Terminal by name, and she apologized.  

• Another time I specifically asked to use the VAT, which was tucked away in the corner of the large all-purpose room used for three precincts in my ward. Escorting me to the VAT, the poll worker said I was the first to use it that day, which became more apparent when she could not get it to operate properly. She apologized and asked her supervisor for assistance, and they were able to troubleshoot the problem. Afterward, I encouraged them to provide signage indicating the availability and location of the VAT, particularly if it could not be placed in a more visible location near the main voting area. 

• In last February’s presidential primary, I took advantage of early, in-person voting at one of our county’s four early voting locations. Poll workers were so eager to welcome and register me that by the time I said I wanted to use the VAT, they had to cancel my ballot and start over so it would work in the VAT. It was an all-hands-on-deck process. It was the third of nine days of early voting, and I was the first voter to use the VAT at that location.  

How You Can Help 

Fully accessible voting includes making sure that the location of a VAT is convenient and well-marked, the process for using it is in plain view, and the device is working properly. When any of those is not the case, someone like me is forced to ask about the VAT, which usually prompts a flurry of anxious activity among poll workers that creates a scene. 

Needing to ask if a VAT is available, where it is located, and how to use it also draws unwanted attention to the fact that I may have a disability. What I and others really want is the seamless access and privacy afforded to other voters—without having to ask for anyone’s assistance in the process. 

Most voters are unaware that the Voter Assist Terminal is available to anyone, with or without a disability. You can help to normalize such access by utilizing the VAT at your polling place. I encourage you to inform poll workers you’d like to use the Voter Assist Terminal whenever you vote, and invite others you know to do the same.  

When it comes to that, your help will be greatly appreciated. 

Terry DeYoung is a volunteer with the ACLU of Michigan’s Clerk Engagement Program. 

By: Robert Williams

This op-ed originally appeared in TIME Magazine 06/28/24 

On January 9, 2020, Detroit Police Department (DPD) officers arrested me on my front lawn in Farmington Hills, Michigan, in front of my wife and two young daughters, for a crime I had nothing to do with. They refused to tell me why, and I had to spend the night sleeping on a cold concrete bench in an overcrowded, filthy jail cell before finally finding out that I was being falsely accused of stealing designer watches from a Detroit boutique.

While interrogating me, a pair of detectives let it slip that I had been arrested based on an incorrect facial recognition identification, a technology that has been proven to be both racist and faulty—especially when used in real-world conditions, like with blurry security footage.

This week we finally reached a settlement in my wrongful arrest lawsuit against the City of Detroit that ensures what happened to me won’t happen again.

Facial recognition technology has access to massive databases with millions of photos — including, at the time I was arrested, a database of 49 million photographs comprising every Michigan driver’s license photo going back years. Anyone who has a driver’s license can be included in these databases. The technology scans them all for similar-looking faces and spits out some possible suspects. Police would tell you they only use this information as a “lead” and then conduct meaningful investigations but my own personal experience, and that of other wrongfully arrested people around the country, refutes that assertion.

Read Full op-ed on Time Magazine

Across the state, clerks carry out the vital work of ensuring our elections run smoothly, safely, and securely. They are devoted public servants who work in our counties, townships, and cities, making sure you can vote and that our democracy thrives. This election year, our hope is to introduce you to some of these hardworking members of our community with brief conversations about what they do and why they are committed to this important work. This edition of Local Election Leaders features Sterling Heights City Clerk Melanie Ryska.

Why did you want to become a clerk?

In my 22 years of being in this industry, I have never met anyone who grew up thinking, “I want to be a Clerk!” More than likely, they fell into this position by chance. I had dreams of being a forensic psychologist, and I graduated with a degree in psychology and minored in criminal justice. While I was busy making other plans, fate drew me into this industry, and my passion for it has kept me here. I began in 2002 by packing precinct election supplies for a small community. I was intrigued by the process and by the thought of having a part in electing our federal, state, and local leaders. I mean, I was doing work (as miniscule as it was) to elect the President of the United States, the Commander in Chief, the “leader of the free world!” How amazing is that?

Add to that, I am a natural problem solver and gravitate toward challenges. And elections are a challenge! But Clerking isn’t just about administering elections. Depending on the type and size of the community, clerks have such robust job responsibilities, that may include: community historian, records management, birth and death records, freedom of information (FOIA) coordinator, licensing, register of deeds, boards and commissions, passports, cemeteries, managing council/board meetings, scheduling, contracts, resolutions, ordinances, utility billing, administering oaths of office, notary services, some even handle treasury tasks, payroll and human resources matters. The list is endless...

Clerks are the hub of local government; they are the behind-the-scenes cog that that keeps the gears turning. When in doubt, ask the clerk. So, to answer the question of why I wanted to become a clerk, the simple answer is… I didn’t. It never crossed my mind. But I, like so many others, have grown to love my role; I have a tremendous respect and passion for public service. Being a clerk gives me a sense of fulfilment, a notion that I am part of the “bigger picture.”

What is the best part of your job? What is the most challenging?

I am grateful for the work I do. Government is complex, and I get to navigate my team and our residents through that puzzle. I get to solve problems and organize the chaos, be a community leader, and offer public service. The best parts of my job are also the most challenging.

Being a leader in a community and serving the public is always challenging. For example, the constitutional and legislative changes over the last few years have fundamentally changed how we administer elections. Navigating those changes with minimal disruption to voters is extraordinarily difficult! Learning new laws, regulations, procedures, etc., while trying to educate the public, legislative bodies, advocacy groups, and the media is overwhelming and stressful.

Clerks must implement complex changes at a moment’s notice and still conduct elections flawlessly or risk criticisms that damage public trust and perception. So, the challenging part of my job… is to perfectly execute the constant barrage of legislative changes while maintaining and strengthening public trust in our electoral process.

What do you want voters to know?

As we embark on the 2024 Presidential Election, I would like voters to remember that clerks are human. We are just like our voters. We have goals, fears, strengths, weaknesses, and we face challenges and triumphs, just as any other person. We take pride in our work. We also take an oath of office to support the Constitution of the United States, the Constitution of the State of Michigan, the Charter/Code/Laws of our local governments and we commit to faithfully discharge our duties to the best of our abilities. We take our jobs seriously, we relentlessly follow the law, we do our very best to execute our jobs perfectly, but we are still only human.

I encourage voters to go in search of information from trusted voices, their clerks. I encourage voters who have questions about nine days of early voting, permanent absentee voting, military and overseas voting, election day voting, voter registrations, etc. to ask their local clerk. I encourage voters who have doubts about the process, the integrity of the system, the security of our elections, to reach out to your local clerk, volunteer to work the election, volunteer to be a part of the process.

And finally, after being in the industry for 22 years, I can say that one of the most appreciated gestures a voter can make is by simply saying “Thank you!” A simple “thank you” can mean so much to a clerk who is pouring their heart and soul, blood sweat and tears into their work, sacrificing time with their families; it can give them the strength to continue to stand up for the integrity and security of our elections, ensuring that each and every voter is heard. So, as we head into this election season, please have grace and patience. Please understand that we are working diligently to serve you.

For information on elections and voting, visit www.mi.gov/vote.

See you at the ballot box!