Yesterday I wrote a story about voting in Louisville that sort of blew up, with thousands of views, many comments, and generally lots of attention. I noted at the end of the story that I would provide an update today on how things went. So, off I went to the Expo Center with my trusty camera and press badge.
Going into the Expo Center
As I traveled west on I-264 to the Fairgrounds, I noticed that the TriMarc digital highway signs had notices about which exit to take for voting. I got off at Preston, as the sign said, then followed the signs down Preston to get to the correct entry street.
Drove around Ring Road (Louisvillians will know whereof I speak) until I got to the parking entrance. Frankly, getting into the parking lot was the only slowdown I had all day, as the traffic was in two lanes and had to merge down to one.
Once parked, I started walking toward the Expo Center. I asked a few people how long it took them to vote. “About a minute,” said one. “In and out, swoosh,” said another, making a jet motion with her hand. A steady stream of people were walking toward the building, as I was, but it wasn’t a giant crowd.
At the edge of the parking lot, before you cross the drive to enter the building, there were two groups of candidate supporters. On my left were the McGrath people, and on my right was a tent with some Booker supporters.
I asked each group if they were paid or volunteer. The Booker group said they were volunteer, except for one staff member from KFTC who was there with them. I got a pic of the three volunteers.
I then walked over and asked the McGrath folks the same question. After I asked twice, the McGrath person nearest me looked at me a moment, then said “Let me have you talk to my boss.” I told him No, I was good, and walked on toward the building.
As I crossed the drive, I noticed a table with water and goodies, apparently put up by some Booker supporters. The young lady working the table was Claire Wyatt, and she was wearing a “From the Hood to the Holler” shirt.
Then, I came across another station where two young women were giving away goodies and water. I asked them which campaign they were from, and they said “Neither.” Surprised, I then asked them what brought then out, and they explained that they had heard that the lines might be long, and they wanted to help out people who might have to stand in line for a long time. “We wanted to support people’s right to vote, and we heard that there would be very limited polling places today in Kentucky, we’ve been reading about it, and just didn’t want people to lose their motivation if they had to stand in line a long time.” And here’s the kicker: they drove down from Brooklyn, New York, to support voters in Kentucky.
In the lobby of the Expo Center
As you entered the building, you saw more than one secure box for dropping off your absentee ballot, if you wanted to.
And, there were multiple hand sanitizer stations set up.
All around the lobby were check-in stations, with tablets containing the new electronic poll books. You went up to any table and gave them your driver’s license. They scanned the back of it where the bar code is, using the camera on the tablet, and up came your voter registration information, including your precinct and which line you needed to get in when you went into the main room.
I had them do my driver’s license, and up came my record immediately. It also noted that I had requested an absentee ballot. If I had wanted to go ahead and vote in person, they would have cancelled my absentee ballot right then.
Inside the main room of the Expo Center
Once someone has checked in and found out which line to use, they go into the main room where the ballots are and the voting takes place. And the first thing I think everyone would see is just how big the place is.
Eighteen different lines, marked by the cones, with social distancing guidance in each. At the end of the line are the poll workers with the paper ballots. I couldn’t help but notice the face shield of the lady on the right.
Patty Steier had a big set of lips drawn on her face shield, but I also noticed her name tag, which said “Cow Patty.” She had also used Peppermint Patty, Paddy Wagon, Patty Cakes, and Crabby Patty during the week of early voting.
Marking and turning in your ballot
Once you get your ballot, you take it to the “ballot-marking” section. There, they had set up a slew of those stand-up private tables for marking your ballot. There was actually a main section of the better tables, and an overflow section of perhaps less-expensive tables.
When you are finished marking your ballot, you take it to the end of the room where the optical scanners are set up. You put it into the scanner, and you’re done.
Miscellaneous notes
Occasionally, you would hear clapping and cheering from one of the ballot tables. Turns out the workers at the tables would do this whenever they had a first-time voter. Pretty cool.
I got a chance to speak with Nore Ghibaudy, the public relations director for the Jefferson County Clerk’s office. He told me that they had 11,111 persons do early-vote-in-person at the Expo Center, from last Monday to yesterday, the day before the election. This didn’t count the ones who came to the Board of Elections headquarters to early vote in person.
He also told me that they sent out over 218,000 absentee ballots for Jefferson County alone. He couldn’t say how many had come in, because they were still coming in, of course.
I was able to get a few shots from higher up, to try to capture the scale of things. Here is the lobby of the Expo Center from the mezzanine. You can see the various check-in stations.
And here is a long shot of the main room, which still doesn’t really do justice to the size of it. You would enter at the upper right, go down the lines (which you can’t really see) to the tables at the upper left to get your ballot, then come to the stand-up tables in the center to mark your ballot, and turn it in to be scanned at the bottom of the picture. Then exit in the lower right.
Here is one of the shuttle buses bringing people from downtown to the Expo Center to vote. They ran every thirty minutes from 6 AM to 6 PM.
Closing thoughts
First of all, I have to say how blown away I was by the well-thought-out plan the local Board of Elections had put together. It flowed well, it was easy to use, the new electronic poll books looked like they worked well, and the entire process was efficient and effective.
While I was there, there was a steady stream of voters coming in and leaving, but it certainly wasn’t overwhelming. They could have easily handled twice or three times the number of people that I saw. I have little doubt that the absentee voting made a big difference.
Of the people I did see, it seemed (to me) to be a large proportion of Black people. We can’t assume they all were going to vote for Booker, but I think it’s safe to say most of them were. And, overall, any excitement I saw was for Charles Booker. I saw persons with shirts and signs for Booker. The only McGrath support I saw was the sign-holders at the drive.
Multiple people pointed out yesterday that no matter how well this was set up, it was still less than ideal, due to the problem some people would have to get there. And that is absolutely true. But, considering the challenges faced by the Board of Elections due to COVID-19, this combined with absentee voting and early in-person voting may have been the best that could be done.
The numbers, of course, remain to be seen. And, once the results are official, we’ll be able to compare them to past primaries, by precinct, and tell if the transportation problem made a difference.
But, no matter how it all turns out, my hat is off to the local BOE for what they planned and executed at the Expo Center. And, my fervent hope is that our Secretary of State will agree to the same expansion of voting for the fall, and into the future.
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Cross-posted from Forward Kentucky, the progressive voice for Kentucky politics