Tuesday, November 4, 2008

DISCUSSION: WILL STARK COUNTY'S BOARD OF ELECTION EVER SOLVE IT'S REPEATED PROBLEMS?

It's been about 3 out of the last four years of election snafus in Stark County's Lake Precinct #4.

In the past the problems has been attributed to a precinct worker who did not get the voting machines to the polls - either at all, or late.

This time the problem was with voters who apparently were not Precinct #14 voters arguing with poll workers on their eligibility to vote in 14.

From 6:56 a.m. through about 7:03 a.m the dispute continued while the five voting machines stood idle, bereft of voters at the voting stations.

Why couldn't the disputatious voters have been taken aside to discuss their problem while other poll workers processed the rest of us through?

The line in #14 was probably about 50 waiting voters deep at the time. Many of those waiting had stopped to vote on their way to work.

Seems to the STARK COUNTY POLITICAL REPORT (The Report) that election officials certainly have had these situations develop in previous elections. Why can't they apply the lessons learned to solve problems quickly as they arise?

Further questions to Stark County Board of Elections director Janette Mullane. Isn't there an "efficiency" procedure in place to deal with differences on voting eligibility at the precinct level? If not, why not? If so, are the workers "trained" in implementing a more efficient way to deal with these matters? How do you explain the delays in Lake #14?

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