The Toyota Center will serve as a vote for the upcoming presidential election in 2020, the Rockets and the Harris County Clerk’s Office announced Thursday.
The Toyota Center will be open to the entire Harris County registered electorate from October 13-30 from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Early Voting and Election Day, November 3, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
“On behalf of the Houston Rockets and Toyota Center, we are revered to help our network by providing a convenient location for the Harris County electorate for the upcoming presidential election,” Doug Hall, general manager and senior vice president of the Toyota Center, told me. . “Voting is an incredibly vital right that many have fought hard for over the years and we would like to thank the Harris County Clerk’s Office for allowing the Rockets and Toyota Center to offer their support.
The Rockets and Houston First will offer loose parking at the Toyota Center during the voting period.
The Rockets have also partnered with I’m a Voter. (iamavoter.com), a nonpartisan motion working to raise awareness and participation in the voting process. Fans can text rocketS to 26797 to verify their voter registration status.
“Our November election will be historic, not only because we elect the president of the United States, but also because we will have to rise to the challenge as a network to ensure that each and every Harris County voter can vote safely.” said Harris County Secretary Chris Hollins. “I am very pleased that the Toyota Center, home to our beloved Houston Rockets, is an early voting and voting day.”
Rockets coach Mike D’Antoni has called for participation in elections, dressed in T-shirts with voting messages and talking about the importance of voting since the NBA restarted.
“This is basic to our democracy,” D’Antoni said last month. “One thing we don’t communicate enough about is that we don’t vote en masse enough. The percentage is too low. Too many pitfalls in front of others to deny them their constitutional right to vote. We’ll have to try to do better.
“Everyone has the right to vote. That’s how things change. That’s how things get bigger. That’s how we got to a bigger place.”
Jonathan Feigen has been the rockets’ editor since 1998 and a basketball enthusiast since before Willis Reed boxed for Game 7. He has become a sports editor because he was the journalist who intended to take the University of Delaware basketball team to play for one more season. lacrosse of college and never looked back.
Feigen, who won the APSE, APME and El Campo Basketball Writers Association in Houston, arrived in Texas in 1981 to do canopy for the Rice Birds, was a sport in Garland before moving to Dallas to make canopy all from the last Hurray of the SMU Southwest Conference after the death penalty.
After joining the Houston Chronicle in 1990, Feigen covered the demise of the SWC, Big 12 and Rockets in the best way.