Missouri Rep. Akin voting, living at different places

ST. LOUIS (AP) - U.S. Rep. Todd Akin has been voting from the address of his old family homestead in St. Louis County despite moving to a different home in a nearby suburb.

Akin, a Republican who recently announced his candidacy for U.S. Senate, lives in the St. Louis suburb of Wildwood at a home that he and his wife purchased near the end of 2007. But he has kept voting at the address of a Town and Country home that has been in the Akin family for more than 50 years, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported Tuesday.

Akin voted in Town and Country as recently as the April municipal election. Both addresses are within Akin's 2nd Congressional District. But the law says voters must cast their ballots in the specific jurisdiction where they live.

In a news release Monday evening, Akin said Town and Country approved a plan May 25 allowing the family's property to be subdivided for development. Akins said he has spent years going through antique wood working tools and other items at the family's sprawling old homestead in Town and Country - which has become surrounded by newer homes - and has transferred cabinets, windows and other items from the old home to the family's new residence. .

The Akin family partnership that owns the land in Town and Country is seeking to subdivide the property and build six homes on the 8.5-acre site.

An Akin spokesman told the Post-Dispatch he wasn't sure exactly when in the past few years the Akins moved to Wildwood.

"There's been a transition from one home to the next, and I don't think there is a crime," said Akin spokesman Steve Taylor.

Akin, as of last week, had not changed his voter registration address from Town and Country. Both of Akin's rivals for the 2012 U.S. Senate race, incumbent Democrat Claire McCaskill, who lives in Kirkwood, and Rolla Republican Sarah Steelman, are registered to vote at their primary residences.

When voters sign the log book at the polls or fill out an absentee ballot, they are swearing to the accuracy of their home address. To provide inaccurate information to election workers is a felony violation of state election laws, according to the Missouri secretary of state's office. But prosecutions for such offenses are rare, said Laura Egerdal, a spokeswoman for Secretary of State Robin Carnahan.

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Information from: St. Louis Post-Dispatch, http://www.stltoday.com