Hamilton County Problems Prompt Poll Worker Retraining – and Firings

[Image courtesy of jeromeburt]

As I’ve blogged multiple times, Hamilton County (Cincinnati), Ohio is conducting a thorough review of voting problems in 2012 – and the latest news involves the consequences of that review for county poll workers, many of whom will lose their jobs.

Cincinnati.com has the story:

Hundreds of Hamilton County poll workers will be retrained – and 163 “retired” – as a result of voting problems in the 2012 election.

That includes 94 workers at 16 precincts that will be completely restaffed because of a high number of errors.

The others failed to vote themselves and/or performed poorly on Election Day.

Those 163 poll workers represent about 5.6 percent of poll workers – the most ever who aren’t being asked back.

The move comes as board of elections officials continue to work to find the 2,905 poll workers needed to staff the county’s 545 polling locations.

The Enquirer obtained the list of problem poll workers and found that 94 of them who worked at 16 polling locations won’t be asked back because they allowed 15 or more votes to be cast at the wrong precinct or in the wrong location.

Records show that, overall, 1,931 votes were cast at the wrong precinct or in the wrong location.

The reasons for the forced retirements vary:

• Six workers at the Madisonville Recreation Center aren’t being asked back because they scored poorly on 11 of the 26 areas assessed.

The precinct judge there, Melowese Richardson, was convicted of voter fraud last month and sentenced to five years in prison. The assessment said there were “multiple fights in the precinct with workers and voters,” one worker refused to work “due to his hurt hand” and poll workers called board headquarters six times with issues.

• 29 won’t be asked back because an assessment of their work showed they don’t vote. The county’s four board of elections members said voting should be a prerequisite to processing other people’s votes.

• 34 won’t be asked back after complaints and notes from Election Day that all poll workers keep showed they weren’t performing up to standards. Some were using outdated procedures, ignoring recent directives.

Hamilton’s effort is part of a larger statewide effort to guarantee poll worker quality:

“There are more and more responsibilities and Ohio is under greater and greater scrutiny in terms of making sure we run a good, clean, fair election,” said Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted.

“Arguably the most important people in doing that are our poll workers. … We need more than a warm body there.”

To help counties find qualified poll workers, Husted’s office now allows high school students to work the polls and last year the office gave out $700,000 in poll worker training grants aimed at improving poll worker quality.

“We can’t afford to have substandard poll workers,” Husted said. “The integrity of our elections is too important.”

In the assessment, Hamilton County looked at 26 criteria from minor things like whether supplies were picked up and the polls opened and closed on time to more serious matters like provisional votes and ballot accounting.

The board has adopted rules that call for a mandatory pass/fail test at the end of each training class, with one opportunity to retake the test after a failing grade.

Cuyahoga County has been testing poll workers since 2007.

“This is very helpful because we know immediately if they are prepared to work on election day and have retained the knowledge required to successfully perform their duties,” said Mike West, the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections media and voter education specialist.

Cuyahoga County did a poll worker assessment of its 7,160 poll workers after the 2012 presidential election.

The 131 poll workers with marginal scores were told they had to go through training again if they wanted to return, West said.

Hamilton County has been in the news lately for the high standard it has applied to voters – especially on the issues of residency and domicile. It’s encouraging to see a similar emphasis on quality for the people on the other side of the check-in table.