No-Show Poll Workers in Jersey City Election
[Image courtesy of beingslowlynowhere]
Jersey City, NJ held a municipal election yesterday, and got off to a rough start when two polling places couldn’t receive voters because pollworkers – who had the voter lists – didn’t show up for work. NJ.com has the details:
An hour-and-a half after polls opened at 6 a.m., state inspectors were sent to pick up voting books from two poll workers in Ward A, one in District 4 and the other in District 6, after they failed to show up to the polling station with the voting books, Michael Harper, the clerk of the Hudson County Board of Elections said.
In the mean time, provisional ballots were made available to voters, officials said.
Harper said that messages had been left at the homes of two poll workers who didn’t show up with the voting books by the time polls opened. The women were finally contacted at 6:45 a.m. and they promised to drop off the voting books.
But by 8 a.m. the workers still had not arrived at the polling site, so inspectors were sent to the house to pick up the ballots and question the poll workers shortly after 8 a.m.
The ballots arrived at the polling station by around 8:30 a.m., he said.
In some ways, this story is familiar; reports of late-arriving poll workers or other delays in opening the polls are commonplace. But in this case, the fact that the no-show poll workers also had the poll books – which are essential to to functioning of a polling place – in their possession, at their homes is quite remarkable.
Local officials seemed confident that the problem, while disappointing, wasn’t suspicious:
Harper said the poll workers were apologetic and despite “failing miserably” at their election duties, he does not suspect foul play.
The Jersey City issue highlights a key issue facing election officials: how to ensure that materials like poll books, ballots and voting machines to polling places are available in time for the doors to open on Election Day.
Because these materials are so essential to the voting process, it is crucial that they be available when polls open; however, each of the choices comes with its own set of problems:
- + pre-positioning voting materials in advance creates chain of custody issues that must then be addressed with seals, locks or other security intended to guard against tampering;
- + waiting until Election Day to deliver materials exposes the process to vulnerabilities – traffic, breakdowns, oversleeping etc., not to mention the cost of a full-scale deployment in pre-dawn hours; and
- + entrusting materials to poll workers to bring on Election Day creates just the kind of risk that Jersey City experienced – while in this case it appears to have been a pure human failure, it can also open up the process to pre-Election Day tampering or even a “denial of service” attack that muddies the outcome by interfering with the orderly conduct of the vote.
Because none of these options is without challenges, the trick in every jurisdiction is to provide for other checks and precautions that ensure that the ballot box is empty (literally or figuratively) at the polling place on Election Day.
Wake-up calls for poll workers might not be a bad idea, either 🙂