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FEDERAL OBSERVERS DISPATCHED TO MONITOR ELECTIONS

WASHINGTON, D.C. The Justice Department will dispatch 32 federal observers to Hamtramck, Michigan and 32 observers to Bronx, Kings and New York Counties, New York to monitor municipal primary elections on September 11, 2001.

Under the Voting Rights Act, which protects the rights of Americans to participate in the electoral process without discrimination , the Justice Department is authorized to ask the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to send federal observers to areas that are specially covered in the Act.

In Michigan, the federal observers will monitor the treatment of Arab-American voters to ensure that they have full and equal access to the voting process and that they are not being racially targeted by poll workers or poll challengers. Observers were authorized for Hamtramck by the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan on August 7, 2000 in a consent decree between the Justice Department and the city of Hamtramck.

In New York, federal observers will monitor polling place activities and New York City's compliance with Chinese and Spanish language election procedures.

The observers, who are supervised by OPM, will watch and record activities during voting hours at select polling locations. Justice Department attorneys will coordinate the federal activities and maintain contact with local election officials.

In addition, Justice Department personnel will monitor the New York City municipal primary election in Queens County and primary elections for municipalities in the Townships of Brookhaven, Huntington and Islip in Suffolk County, New York.

To lodge complaints about discriminatory voting practices in this election, voters may call the federal examiner at 1-888-496-9455. At all times, complaints about discriminatory voting practices may be called in to the Voting Section of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division at 1-800-253-3931.