I am going through some old content on Stack Overflow and voting to close. For example, questions that are specific to one person's homework and may have been resolved with a simple typo fix or something. Or exam preparation study recommendations, e.g., How does one prepare for the ColdFusion 9 ACE exam? (yes I know the "meta effect" will likely take care of this one shortly).
Some of the questions I run into I have already seen some time in the past, and voted to close long ago. I understand that close votes expire (I have read Why do close votes expire?) and my original close votes had indeed expired. However, this seems to prevent me from ever voting to close that question again. Even years later.
I raised a moderator flag for some of these, and some worked but I also got a rap on the knuckles from a moderator with the note "declined - Please use standard close votes or close flags for this instead of flagging for moderators." Yes, I would if I could, but the system no longer lets me. Since I have vote-to-close rights on SO, I don't have the ability to use a "close flag". If I want to tidy these questions up (and I do; you can discuss my OCD+deletionist tendencies in the comments), flagging is my only option.
Can there be an expiration period for expired close votes? I guess I can see why close votes prevent one from repeatedly voting to close after their vote expires. But say, a year after a close vote expires I should be able to vote to close the question again.
:/