Fitness, Fellowship, Faith
Fitness, Fellowship, Faith
For years, I would go into polling locations to see nothing but octogenarians, barely clinging to life, almost indistinguishable from thehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXnL7sdElno. I kept saying to myself that some younger blood ought to be up in there, shuffling democracy (ok, constitutional republic, geez) along. Then, somehow, in August, I heard about the county needing poll workers for the then-upcoming election. I channeled my inner Fuse Box when he started our first blood drive, when he said “someone should do that; oh, that probably means it should be me”.
Went to a 3 hour training session in September about how to do “Help Desk” at the polls. I can see now that I didn’t understand what that training was really about until election day. I knew it was important & I was fairly intimidated. The processes didn’t make sense. I was the only rookie in the training, so I didn’t feel comfortable asking for more time or help (big surprise). They gave a manual, but only 60% would apply to my precinct’s situation; & I wouldn’t know which 60% until the day of.
The training itself didn’t teach me much. It was being in the thick of it that I learned a ton. Here’s what I got.
Civics Lesson
– Help Desk = provisional voting. Voting is a right✳, not a privilege. There are a lot of reasons why someone doesn’t show up in the voting database. If I could solve it quickly, like they have come to the wrong precinct, then I tell them where their correct precinct is (I checked www.unioncountyncelections.gov/for all things Union County; vt.ncsbe.gov/PPLkup/ for polling locations). Other times, we just don’t know. So I would give them a provisional ballot. It’s the exact same sheet as everyone else’s ballot. But their vote only counts if they provide the Board of Elections the missing info within 3 days of their vote. If they don’t, their vote doesn’t count. I had the privilege of doing a lot of paperwork (both printed & electronic) to attest who they said they were, show them their ballot was being secured in its own envelope, & subsequently secured in its own special red bag (to ensure it didn’t get counted in the regular tabulating machines).
– Unlike Oma or Nana, I made sure people comprehended the 3 day deadline. “If you don’t get this done in 3 days, your vote will NOT count. Do you understand?” For EVERYONE I said that to, they all replied with a determination (not seen 20 seconds before) that they were going to the BoE office to get this straightened out.
– Bureaucracy as a Benefit. We had 4 laptops at our precinct. None had access to the internet, nor were they networked together in anyway. They were essentially in airplane mode. Exactly 1 printer could print on only 1 laptop in all of UC (via USB). My first problem of the morning was that I was on laptop #412 trying to use printer #413. Smooth as butter once a superheroine brought in printer #412 from Monroe.
– When you walk in, you speak to one person who looks you up & prints out your ATV (Authorization to Vote) form. You both sign it, essentially certifying both did their due diligence. You (voter) then walk this form over to a separate election official who hands you a ballot. Those ballots are carefully counted & recounted throughout the day by multiple people. Not in how you voted, but how many blanks did the precinct start with minus the ballots in the tabulator minus the provisional ballots minus the spoiled ballots.
– You (voter) take your paper ballot to mark your choices. The following questions came up enough times throughout the day that I’ll share them for everyone’s benefit.
– There is no single place to mark all of one political party without you having to mark the entire ballot (no straight party voting). And not every race forces a candidate to declare a party.
– Your complete ballot is still valid if you do not choose anyone for a particular race.
– Some races allow you to select more than one candidate.
– Your vote still counts if you only select 2 instead of 3 candidates (for the race that allowed 3 choices).
– If you messed up the ballot in any way, you could ask for a new one. But you have to give back the messed up ballot to get a new one. The messed up one is considered a spoiled ballot (similar to voiding a check).
– You (voter) then take your paper ballot to a tabulator that essentially tallies your vote like a scantron. The paper ballot goes into the bin below it, maintaining the paper copy.
– At the close of voting, the paper ballots go one place, the data is exported out of tabulators onto USB drives (while also printing a paper receipt) in another place, the ATVs go another place, and the laptop data is exported onto USB drives. They all take separate paths back to Monroe.
– All that to say, multiple people, multiple systems, multiple checkpoints. Here, for something so important, efficiency is the enemy. Yes, make it as easy & efficient as possible for us to vote. But make the systems behind it redundant, slow, & bureaucratic.
– Every person matters. About lunchtime, the precinct judge (title only, not an actual litigating judge) came by each of those laptops & gave us 2 names to lookup & mark as already voted. I don’t know the story of why (judge didn’t know either), but I was impressed we were getting updates mid-election for something like that.
– Being a poll worker is a paid position. But paid like jury duty kind of wages. Time on site only; no transportation stipend.
– Very little trash. NOTHING gets thrown away. My trashcan had snotrags, candy wrappers, and broken straps. That’s it. Spoiled ballots are kept separately, but still kept. All papers were thickly laminated for years of reuse. All equipment (laptops, printers) came in its own labeled storage tote. Easy to see what came with what for both packing & unpacking.
– Purposeful division. Each precinct has a nonpartisan judge & 2 partisan judges; 1 Democrat & 1 Republican. We, as poll workers, knew who each of the 3 were. It was never important for voters to know who they were. The nonpartisan was a floater in our precinct, while the 2 partisan judges were active participants. At no time did I ever witness the 2 partisan judges behave in a partisan way. Some voters came in wearing very partisan garb, & neither of them reacted positively or negatively to anything. If you couldn’t tell, I ain’t tellin’.
Humanity
• Purposeful unity. For all the other poll workers (myself included), we all did our best not to reveal our political leanings. Independently, we all ended up wearing clothes that were neither red nor blue; we went for gray, green, black, etc.
– We were a vibe. We all got along really well. Even working from 5:30 AM to 8:30 PM, with only a break when you could take it (the crowds were small enough to manage going 1 down), our spirits were high throughout. Energized by the continuous, steady stream of voter turnout. When we found out it was someone’s first time voting, we all cheered a la “Welcome to Moe’s”. It felt one way to cheer for a young 20 something on their first vote; completely different cheering for someone in their 40s voting for the first time as an American citizen.
– I thought I would be the youngest at 54, but there was a college woman there, & it wasn’t her first election! She’s a 3rd generation poll worker! Then there was some other guy in his late 30s (no opportunity to EH him).
– The hour after closing was the longest hour. No one could leave until the 3 judges agreed on the final numbers. There was no bickering at all. It was a conscientious process of looking for the truth. We were off by 1 vote for about 30 of those 60 minutes. Even then, no one was upset or frustrated. Gave us time to start learning about each other. Very coffeteria-like.
• I saw the full breadth of humanity. Young & old. Babies in car seats. One parent with multiple kids. Elementary age kids genuinely excited to be invited to a grown up space. Teens calculating how much longer until they get to participate in democracy. Current & former neighbors. Current & former Pax. Elderly with a cane, or a walker, but nothing beat the woman with a fold up lounge chair from the 80s who sat in the chair while waiting then used it as a cane when folded.
• We (poll workers) had as long of a conversation as we could with you (voter). We beat the robots. When I was looking up someone’s address, I would often respond, “I’m a fellow Lawsonite!” or “I’m just across the cemetery from you in Lawson.” I think I saw in many a realization that I was their neighbor AND a civil servant, simultaneously. It humanized us. We were here in a common space, sharing our differing voices, & honoring the action.
• Having lived almost my entire life within a 5 mile radius, it would be understandable for me to be pretty disgruntled at all the people coming into my small piece of heaven. All the traffic. All the different viewpoints. I try not to joke any more about someone moving down south (except you, Ohioans. I completely understand why you want to get out. But leave that Buckeye crap behind. It’s why no one likes you.).
I had the chance to talk to a few chatty new-to-the-area neighbors while doing all the paperwork. When they talked about just moving here, I casually, but sincerely responded, “Welcome home.” Most were taken aback. I could even see the
Would I do it again? I’d love to.
What’s next? I’ve sat on a jury through a whole trial to learn about (a part) of our judicial system. Did this. Next up – www.waxhaw.com/government/departments/administration/waxhaw-101
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