Central State students lose walkable polling place days before Election Day
Editorial illustration — Press Pass USAStudents who live on the Central State University campus will cast their ballots about six miles away on Tuesday, November 3, after the city of Xenia's annexation of the campus moved them into a new voting precinct. For years, they walked across U.S. 42 to vote at neighboring Wilberforce University.
Their new Election Day polling place is Xenia Grace Chapel, WYSO reported. The change follows Xenia's annexation of Central State's main campus on September 24, which shifted campus residents out of their old township precinct.
Greene County Board of Elections Director Tracy Smith told WYSO that Central State had been in precinct 354, a township precinct, and that his office had to get quick approval from its board and the Ohio Secretary of State to reassign voters. Smith said the board has notified more than 617 Central State voters and will bring absentee ballot applications to campus.
Smith said a permanent fix is coming next year: the board will create a new Xenia city precinct for Central State. "Next year, we'll make a Xenia city precinct 324. That'll be Central State's precinct, brand new," he told WYSO.
The annexation itself came after more than a decade of negotiations, Spectrum News reported. Under the deal, Central State gets lower-cost water and sewer service, and Xenia can collect city income tax from students who live on campus.
Central State is Ohio's only public historically Black university and its only 1890 land-grant university, and it enrolls about 2,700 students. Wilberforce University students are not affected and can still vote on their own campus, a Wilberforce spokesperson told Spectrum News.
For students without cars, six miles is a real barrier. "A lot of people are not fortunate to have transportation," Central State senior Damari Lipscomb told WHIO. Student government member Cierra Gee told Spectrum News the trip "kind of discourages people from voting."
Students are organizing around the change. The Ohio Legislative Black Caucus is offering free rides to the polls, and Central State and its Greek organizations are coordinating transportation and ballot forums. Oluwatoyin Oderinde, president of Central State's National Pan-Hellenic Council, told Spectrum News organizers hope to run about seven vans, depending on sign-ups.
Ohio polls are open from 6:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. on Election Day, Tuesday, November 3. Voters can confirm their assigned polling place through the Ohio Secretary of State's voter lookup.
Sources: WYSO (as reported Nov. 1, 2026); Spectrum News (as reported Nov. 1, 2026); WHIO (as reported Nov. 1, 2026); The Quintessential Gentleman (Nov. 1, 2026); Dayton Weekly News (annexation background).
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