City of Gulfport adopts changes to its voting precincts

The Gulfport City Council voted Friday to approve new precincts for future city elections ahead of a looming deadline.

The city faced a July 31st deadline to get these changes approved.

Under this new plan, Ward Five has two new voting locations, Ward Two is down to two voting locations, Ward Four keeps its two precincts, Wards 1 and 3 have three voting locations a piece, with Wards 6 and 7 having just one voting location .

“It’s really a double edged challenge, we want to have, you know, voting to be as accessible and easy as possible in the city and with the precincts. Part of the challenge is getting people to actually work the precincts from the voting component. And so we want to make sure we had them properly staffed,” said Mayor Billy Hewes.

We don’t anyone to have problems with voting. We want access to voting to be just like the federal system says that there are no impediments. So we’re very grateful today that the council passed this,” said Ward Two Councilwoman Ella Holmes-Hines.

These new precincts and voting locations will be in effect for the 2025 city elections.