DOD announces Absentee Voting Week dates

Published Sept. 25, 2012
By Tech. Sgt. Steve Grever
Air Force Personnel Center Public Affairs

JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO-RANDOLPH, Texas -- Federal Voting Assistance Program officials have declared the week of Sept. 27 to Oct. 4 as Absentee Voting Week to ensure service members and their families are aware of upcoming voting absentee deadlines before the Nov. 6 general election.

Absentee Voting Week follows Armed Forces Voters Week (also known as Overseas Citizens Voters Week), which took place from June 28 to July 7. AFVW and OCVW focused on helping voting assistance officers deliver federal post card applications to military members and their voting-age family members. These applications allow voters to register to vote and request a ballot.

During AVW, installation and unit voting assistance officers will set up booths outside the commissary and base exchange and brief Airmen about the Air Force Voting Assistance Program at commanders' calls. They will also help Airmen register to vote and fill out Federal Write-in Absentee Ballots, if necessary. This form is used by local election officials if state ballots don't arrive on time to be counted.

Absentee voters should contact their installation or unit voting assistance officers if they need assistance with their FPCA or FWAB.

"In most cases, voters don't require the assistance of the IVA office or their UVAO anymore, said William D'Avanzo, Air Force voting action officer. "They can go to the FVAP website at www.fvap.gov and use the automated assistant to complete both forms, save them as PDF files or print them out."

Deployed Airmen are also given the opportunity to complete an FPCA prior to their deployments. Each deployed installation has voting assistance officers to help them complete an FPCA or FWAB as well.

"Timing is everything. There are deadlines for mailing ballots for each state listed on the FVAP website," D'Avanzo said. "We want to make sure the military vote is counted, so the time to get ballots in the mail is now."

For more information on the Federal Voting Assistance Program, go to http://www.fvap.gov.