The Hamilton County Election Commission did the right thing by turning down a request from the Chattanooga City Council to add two more early voting sites for the March 7 city election.
But, once the full Election Commission is able to study the situation without the mechanics of an election bearing down on its members, it may want to consider, if feasible, at least one more satellite early voting site.
Currently, the sites are located essentially downtown (at the Election Commission, off Amnicola Highway), the north end of the city (North River Civic Center) and the east end of the city (Brainerd Youth and Family Development Center).
A satellite site at the South Chattanooga Youth and Family Development Center, as City Councilman Chris Anderson has suggested, would essentially be in the south end of the city.
If the number of registered voters are taken into account, a fifth one should probably be at the far east end of the city limits in East Brainerd or Ooltewah.
The City Council proposed two sites, the other one being at the Glenwood Youth and Development Center. That one, though, makes less sense because it is - according to Google Maps and depending on the route - from 3.4 to 4.6 miles, or eight to 12 minutes, from the Election Commission and four miles, or nine minutes, from the Brainerd Youth and Family Development Center.
However, the South Chattanooga Youth and Family Development Center is 4.3 miles, or 11 minutes, from the Election Commission but from 7.2 to 8.5 miles, or 20 minutes, to the Brainerd Center, and from 11.1 to 13.6 miles, or 22 to 25 minutes, from the North River Civic Center.
The $15,000 expense of the site versus the potential vote may be the determining factor for the Election Commission. Each satellite must be staffed daily for nearly two weeks with workers. In the last city election in 2013, turnout was 8.6 percent in Alton Park 1 and 10.43 percent in Alton Park 2, among the closest precincts to the South Chattanooga Center. But it was, for example, 13.9 percent in Concord 2 and 12.3 percent in East Brainerd 1.
State law, according to election commissioners, requires only one satellite site for early voting. Chattanooga has two sites for city elections and a third for countywide votes.
Anderson and Election Commissioner Kelvin Scott cited the accessibility of financially and transportation-poor voters as a factor in favor of the suggested sites.
But the decision needs more study than was available to be done between when Anderson made his original suggestion on Dec. 20 and the first day of early voting on Feb. 15.