CLEVELAND — The Cuyahoga County Board of Elections could soon have a new headquarters, with County Executive Chris Ronayne on Friday announcing a plan to move the agency's operations to the old Plain Dealer building on Superior Avenue in downtown Cleveland.
Ronayne says the lease agreement with building owner Superior LLC would run for 17 years and cost the county no more than $5.4 million annually. The deal, which is subject to approval by Cuyahoga County Council, would see the Board of Elections move out of its current location several blocks away on Euclid Avenue.
"Securing a new location for the Board of Elections is a necessary step towards delivering superior services and better voting access to our residents," Ronayne said in a statement, with his office claiming the Board "has outgrown its current space." "This move demonstrates our commitment to prioritizing the needs of our community and improving access to County services."
The agreement was be introduced to County Council at Tuesday's scheduled meeting, where 3News spoke to Ronayne about his plans for the location.
"[There will be] more modern space for more modern services," he told us. "We can place more election booths in the building."
Besides the Board of Elections, Ronayne says a number of Health and Human Services employees would be moved to the new location. The county would also renovate the Virgil E. Brown Building on Payne Avenue and sell the Jane Edna Hunter Social Services Center on Euclid, the same place where HHS currently houses its administrative headquarters.
Following 21 years in the space, cleveland.com and Plain Dealer owner Advance Publications sold the building in 2022, moving journalists and other workers to the paper's publishing center on Tiedeman Road in Brooklyn. The building has sat mostly vacant since, but in seeking to lease the location, county officials cited "more parking, interior space for early voting queues, and improved conditions for employees."
Ronayne believes the improved space could encourage more people to vote.
"To queue up outside, waiting sometimes in the rain, to have to little parking sometimes can be a factor that either is make-or-break to someone that is deciding to vote on an Election Day."
The Board of Elections has been at its Euclid Avenue spot since 1987, and officials say the change comes amid an increase of early in-person voting. During a presidential election, Board of Elections Director Anthony Perlatti says the county gets at least 50,000 voters in the downtown location, and the PD building will offer more a bigger footprint.
"The Cuyahoga County Board of Elections welcomes the opportunity to move operations to the 1801 Superior Avenue location," Perlatti wrote last week. "This location signifies a new chapter in our commitment to deliver reliable and efficient election services to Cuyahoga County voters."
If approved, the lease would likely begin this July, with payment coming from both the general budget fund along with the Health and Human Services levy.