My adventures as a poll worker circa 2009

My adventures as a poll worker – year 2

Tuesday was Election Day in the United States. I don’t know how other states across our great union handle this day but in Ohio the polls are run by volunteers who get a meager stipend for the 16 -18 hours (including poll worker training) they work for each election. I hate to be a cynic but the old adage that you get what you pay for certainly holds true in this case. More on that in a minute.

This election found me in a single ward/precinct polling place. For this one precinct there were 6 workers – a polling location coordinator, a presiding judge, and 4 other judges. I was the only Republican for miles around; therefore I had the coveted position of signing off on every document that went through the precinct as the “opposing judge.” Its funny – all day long the others kept saying – as if I couldn’t hear them – “she needs to sign, she’s the Republican” with emphasis on Republican as if it was pure evil.

My polling location was in a community room on the main floor of a high rise apartment building that caters to senior citizens. OMG did that add to the comedy of errors! Two of my fellow poll workers lived “in the building” as they put it – both were really hard of hearing, and one had sight issues too. But God love them, they were there doing their civic duties.

Lots of the voters lived “in the building” as well so we had lots of folks who have coke bottle lenses in their glasses, hearing aids in one or both ears, canes, walkers and bad dye jobs. To compound things the population in this voting precinct is heavily Russian. Many of them have never learned to speak English even though they are citizens of this great nation of ours (something that should be a requirement for citizenship IMHO.) The Board of Elections does not provide a translator and no one in my cadre of workers had any inkling of the Russian language so were really unable to help them. It started off badly when they approached the precinct table to check in and we couldn’t understand their names, nor could we figure out what the first letter was based on the pronunciation. We weren’t even really sure of which their first name was and which their last was. We would ask for ID and they would look at us blankly; nervously, sadly, all of the above. One poor woman broke down and began sobbing because she did not understand but she wanted to vote. She couldn’t read the ballot. Apparently the apartment building manager’s secretary speaks Russian but either he will no longer allow her to translate or he has been told by the BOE not to get involved. It really was a sad situation.

Between the old people and the Russians it was a real circus. It was even more confusing when they are old AND Russian and the poll worker is hard of hearing! There was a woman who came into vote who said her last name was Davis. She even spelled it D – A – V – I – S. My counter part working with the A to M Poll Book thought she said E – A – V – I – S. I tried to help and said D as in Dog – well Lord knows what she thought I said because then she flipped to the C section of the book. In the mean time the voter kept saying “Davis, Ms. Margaret Ann Davis.” The young man (he was 18 working his first election) handing out ballots was trying so hard not to laugh. And that was with a name like Davis. You should see what happened when someone named Yengeniya Zhorova or E. Chepchumba K Yego showed up! We had more defaced (incorrectly marked) ballots for this election than we had during all three of the elections I worked last year – including the presidential election. Really – this seems like an archaic way to determine the direction of our government.

As I mentioned previously, a poll workers day is roughly 14 hours long – not counting the commute time to and from the polling location or the required poll worker training. During those 14 hours on Tuesday my location had a grand total of just under 200 voters. Doesn’t really seem like very many people considering all the time and people involved. Nor does it feel very efficient. I was always told not to criticize how something works unless I could present a better option – which I don’t have. A lot of people say we should move to online voting from the privacy of our own homes. But I’d go out on a limb and venture to say that the majority of the 200 voters I saw on Tuesday don’t have personal computers. And once you open up online voting to include public computers you would have to build in safeguards of some sort to make sure their was no “acorning” going on. That would probably lead back to some sort of set up similar to what we had on Tuesday – so not really a better idea at all. I don’t know how to fix it. But I do feel in my heart that it is broken.

At least we live in a country where we are allowed to express our opinion and make a difference by casting our vote - that's what's really important. Too often individuals don't exercise this great privilege - I sure hope you took advantage of your right to vote this past week. Did you?