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p. 3

spell no. 002

Ballotbox (Real Advocacy)

ballotbox, a nonpartisan tool for finding where to vote. adopted by the Union City Youth Council for voting initiatives, with planned adoption by a League of Women Voters chapter; helped register 40+ new voters and increased reported JLHS voter turnout by 20%

askhow few steps can it actually take to get from “where do i vote” to real directions

ingredients
Next.jsGoogle Civic Information APILeafletcivic tech
state
shippedproject
note
adopted by the Union City Youth Council · League of Women Voters adoption planned
cast it
live (opens Ballotbox (Real Advocacy))github
annotation

election day sends you to one assigned place, early voting usually doesn't work that way, so the app has to show both

Ballotbox at realadvocacy.us: the heading “Find Your Polling Place”, an address field, and a Find My Polling Place button.
the home page at realadvocacy.us, enter an address and get your voting locations
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✦ casting notes

01Where it got interesting

voting info is only useful if it's actually right, so i didn't want to make any of it up. addresses get geocoded through Google, and polling places, early voting sites, and drop boxes come straight from the Google Civic Information API, which pulls from data that state and local election officials actually submit. Leaflet draws it all on an OpenStreetMap map so distances and directions are obvious at a glance.

the rules matter just as much as the data. on election day you're assigned one specific place, early voting usually lets you go anywhere in your county, and drop boxes run on their own hours. i kept each type separate and every page links out to the local election office and vote.gov so people can double check

02Where it landed

live at realadvocacy.us and adopted by the Union City Youth Council for voting initiatives, with adoption by a League of Women Voters chapter planned. the initiative helped register 40+ new voters and increased reported JLHS voter turnout by 20%. besides the lookup tool there are step-by-step guides for voting in person, early, or by mail, plus pages on finding your sample ballot, checking your registration, and knowing your rights under the Help America Vote Act. it's strictly nonpartisan, built with Next.js, deployed on Vercel