* *** POSTMORTEM_2022-05-17 TXT - 23 May 2022 22:33:34 - JGKNAUTH Postmortem Report for Precinct 19-19 for 5/17/2022 Election ---------- ------ --- -------- ----- --- --------- -------- > SUMMARY < ======= The voter turnout at Precinct 19-19 was good. It started out very light, but picked up significantly by mid-morning and stayed that way until late afternoon. During those more active times there were usually at least a few people in line -- sometimes as many as ten or so. However by the end of the day it got very quiet again. There was only one voter at closing, who just got in under the wire. Most of the day we were busy enough that we weren't bored, but we also never felt overwhelmed. The weather was very good all day on Election Day. In contrast, on Monday there was much rain in the late afternoon; that hindered our outdoor setup. We had no significant election problems. Some minor ones are described below. COVID was not a big issue; a number of voters wore masks, but most did not. No one asked for a mask or COVID-free pen. > STATISTICS < ========== The calculations below use the number of voters registered as of 5/4/22 who were eligible to vote in this partisan primary election. Registered Libertarians (there are only 50 in Precinct 19-19) were not eligible to vote since there were no Libertarian primary candidates. The turnout for this election was about 10.7% at the polling place and 7.5% via absentee voting (mail-in or one-stop) for a total of about 18.2% of registered voters eligible for this partisan primary election. Tabulator vs. ATV counts: 832 vs. 832 Provisional ballots: 6 Spoiled ballots: 5 Emergency bin ballots: 0 Challenged ballots: 0 Curbside voters: 12 (approx -- I forgot to record the final count) AutoMARK voters: 0 Observers: 0 (0 Precinct-Specific Observers) (0 At-Large Observers) Registered voters: 7812 (of which 7762 were eligible for this election) (as of 5/4/22) Monday-list absentees: 580 (the long list in Pollbook box #1) Last-minute absentees: 1 (the short list gotten from the PO website) ---- Total absentees: 581 Voting booths: 21 (including 1 provisional and 1 accessible) Total chairs at tables: 4 (at 4 square 42" tables) -- Total "booths" 25 Ballot Count Reconciliation web page: http://jgkhome.name/WakeBOE/Ballot_Count_Reconciliation_2022-05-17.htm > STAFFING AND EMAIL CONSIDERATIONS < ======== === ===== ============== By Election Day we ended up with twelve Officials after several dropouts and replacements. We needed them all. Of the twelve, four had never worked an election; four others had worked only one. All lived in Precinct 19-19. We moved people around a lot to give them experience in various areas. They all did very well and we want them back for future elections. As usual, there were some email spam filter problems with several Officials. Followup phone calls were required to reach them. One Official was never able to receive my emails reliably; we don't know why. Possibly it was an nc.rr.com spam filter problem. > CJ PORTAL AIRTABLE REPORTS < == ====== ======== ======= The CJ portal was again very helpful for getting up-to-date information about assigned Officials. > POLLING PLACE SETUP < ======= ===== ===== 1) We used the same basic 3-RT-Officials configuration we have used for several elections now. http://jgkhome.name/WakeBOE/Sanford_Creek_Elementary_Layout_3RT.pdf It gives a good deal of room for pollbooks to be spread out on the tables. Also, using only three Registration Table (RT) Officials seems to provide the right rate of flow so we don't get a line of people at the Ballot Table (BT), which happened when we used four RT Officials. 2) We set up the full Disney line, but never got a large enough surge of voters to require it in this election. We used the shortcut all day. Similarly we set up a row of tables as alternate voting booths, but never required them. 3) We provided many signs and floor arrows to guide people from the voting booths to the (sometimes not visible) Tabulator. We used masking tape marked with a red marker to create the floor arrows; I had tested to make sure the red ink would not bleed thru the masking tape to the carpet. In previous years sometimes voters got confused because they couldn't see the Tabulator, which can be hidden when many people are standing in the RT wait lines; then they weren't sure which way to go to cast their ballots. The signs, arrows, and directions from the Voting Booth Official have solved that. This time we had no problems at all in this area. However, two of our Precinct Officials have subsequently said they thought some of the voters were still confused. I didn't see that at all. I was monitoring that area a good part of the day to check that the red floor arrows and the big red arrow sign in front worked. I also didn't hear anything from any of the Voting Booth Officials, one of whose jobs was to direct the voters to the Tabulator: "Follow the RED arrows." The two Officials want to change the room layout to keep those voters on the way to the Tabulator from crossing in front of the RT lines. I had looked at that a good deal in the past when someone else had suggested it, but their suggested configuration broke immediately. When I then tried to come up with a non-crossing configuration that did work, I couldn't create one which didn't have significant problems that the current crossing configuration had already solved or never had in the first place. I have asked any Officials who want to make such a change to produce a detailed diagram for their proposal(s) so there can be no misinterpretation of what they were proposing. I sent them my PowerPoint file for the voting enclosure layout so they don't have to start from scratch, but can just carefully move around things under PowerPoint to create a diagram with accurate room and furniture measurements. I had previously sent them emails pointing out some of the things they needed to avoid and some facilities/spaces they needed to provide. Those emails certainly didn't provide a complete list, but all the Officials have the detailed diagram and supporting documentation for the current configuration to help see what is required. Because of some personal things I now have to deal with, for the near future I will be less available than usual to review and provide detailed comments on whatever they come up with. 4) Because of the time of year, it stayed light enough that we did not have to put LEDs on the "Vote Here" sign at the turn to the Media Center door. It gets very dark there in the Fall. > POLLBOOKS < ========= 1) In contrast to the last election, I did not hear of any problems with polling book binder rings that did not close properly. 2) We used eight of the ten pollbooks, leaving the other two as spares. We never had to switch to a spare, e.g., because of a ring problem or a need to redistribute the letters. 3) The pollbooks were originally in three huge boxes. During packup we were able to consolidate everything into just two of the boxes and flattened the third. This was because three unflattened boxes would not have fit in my car with all the other items that had to be put there Tuesday night. > REGISTRATION TABLE AND LINES < ============ ===== === ===== 1) After mid-morning we had an almost continuous flow of voters; the RT lines were seldom empty. However the lines were never long enough that we had to use our Disney line. Our Line Monitor Official greeted voters and directed them to the proper one of the three alphabetic lines we had set up for three RT stations. When one of the lines built up and its Official was busy currently handling a voter, available Officials would ask people in that line if their name letters would allow use of a pollbook not currently being used for that line. Then that person could skip ahead and be handled with the available pollbook by an available Official. The Line Monitor could also detect someone in an RT line who was a transfer-in and send that person to the Help Table immediately instead of having the person wait in line until an RT Official could send them to the HT. In keeping with the above skip-ahead process, for future elections we might create some signs the available RT Officials could hold up to ask if there were any people in line who could be served with a specific available pollbook's letter range. I noticed that it was sometimes hard for the RT Officials to communicate with voters about this. It can be hard to hear, especially when there are many people in the room; being able to display a pollbook's letter range could help. 2) We used the same file jacket technique in this election as in previous elections to allow larger letters on the RT signs. Our RT lines must be pretty far back from the RT to allow voters going from the booths to the Tabulator to cross between the RT and the RT lines. The larger letters are easier to see from the RT waiting lines. Small, hard-to-read letters can be a problem when viewed from the back ends of the lines, which is where you really need to know which line is which so you can get in the right one. 3) One RT Official stuck the wrong sticker on an ATV. She then followed the "spoiled" procedure. As far as I know, the voter for the spoiled ATV did not come in later, so the Official did not have to handwrite the label information. > BALLOT TABLE AND VOTING BOOTHS < ====== ===== === ====== ====== 1) The RT passed thru voters very quickly to the BT, but there was never a big backup at the BT. The BT Officials were handling things very efficiently even though there were two ballot styles to deal with. We had a small BT waiting area to use, which worked well, but it was seldomly required. We did forget to put down that area's "wait here" blue tape line. We will be sure to put it down next time. 2) One of our Help Table (HT) Officials assisted the BT by going thru a ringed pack of ATVs as soon as it was available to make sure there were no sequence number errors or major information missing. He caught several number problems, which the BT Officials were able to correct immediately instead of finding the errors later during the ATV/Tabulator check. In future elections, if an HT Official is available (often the case), we will continue this practice. 3) During the day I was able to audit all but the last 32 of the 832 ATVs from the Ballot Table. I found very few ATV errors. I saw very few "V"s and don't recall seeing a single "ID". The Help Table did process several "V"s. 4) Our Voting Booth Officials kept the booths clean, directed voters to available booths, and then to the Tabulator. They also found items the voters had left behind: a purse (the voter later returned and we gave her the purse) and a pair of sunglasses (that voter never returned). The BOE Help Line told us to put the sunglasses in the blue bag for their lost and found department. I also left a note for our Media Center contact about how the voter could reach the BOE if the voter ever called the school about the sunglasses. 5) None of our classes or documentation said we should clean pens after the voters used them. Our Coordinator suggested we do this. > HELP TABLE < ==== ===== 1) We had two Officials at the HT all day, but had only one laptop this election. Fortunately the Help Table flow was light; there were just six Provisional Envelopes. 2) The situation that required the most work was for a transfer-in voter. The Officials at the old precinct had not filled out Section D at all and instead had the voter sign Section A, which the Official then initialed -- all wrong things to do. They then sent the voter to her new precinct. At least they sent her to the right new precinct, 19-19. Our HT Officials immediately saw all the problems and told the voter the two options available: 1) go back to the old precinct and have their HT Officials do it right this time (our Officials wrote down detailed instructions for the voter to give to the old precinct's HT Officials) or 2) vote a Provisional Envelope in our precinct. The voter wanted to be sure her vote was counted on Election Day, so she chose option 1. Our HT Officials also called the Help Line to let them know about the problem so they would contact the old precinct and make sure this voter was now handled properly and they would do the right thing for other transferring voters. It all worked out. When the voter got to her old precinct, they apparently had heard from the BOE about their mistakes and apologized to the voter, then filled out the ATV correctly. The voter then came back to our polling place, where she was properly transferred in. She then voted normally in our precinct. The voter was very nice during all this extra traveling and processing. 3) Near the end of the day one of the HT Officials told me he thought he might have forgotten to write the "P" and old precinct number on a ballot. I told him to put a note about that on the Provisional Envelope to get the attention of the people processing the envelope. Unfortunately in my audits I cannot catch this sort of thing since the envelopes are already sealed by the time I see them. I just have to depend on the Officials to follow each envelope's checklist and only check things off as they do them, not in one big checkmarking surge after they have (supposedly) done all the steps. 4) On the Provisional Envelope there is a checkbox for "Write VOID on the voter's ATV or related forms ..." The question is how should we mark that box when there is no ATV or related form to attach to the Provisional Envelope? Our HT Officials had just been making a checkmark. Our coordinator suggested using an "NA", which is more accurate. Does the BOE have a preference? In fact this same question applies in many areas, e.g., in the checklists on all the plastic bags where some item for insertion does not exist. I certainly haven't been consistent in how I mark such boxes: checking, NAing, or putting a horizontal line thru the box. If there is a preference for all these, the BOE should document it. Since I haven't heard any complaints over the years, I'm assuming any of the above is fine. > CURBSIDE < ======== 1) We had about a dozen curbside voters. The cars tended to come in bursts; once we had three cars lined up. We could usually find a second Official pretty easily by doubling up work for someone else. Then we could handle two voters at a time, which we often did. 2) Most of the curbsides were standard. However we had one in which the voter's current residence address was not as listed in the pollbook and laptop. In fact the street was not known to the laptop. It turned out that the county had renamed the street and the BOE database did not yet reflect the change. The Help Line told the Help Table how to have the ATV filled out and the voter was then able to vote. 3) As in past elections, we used masking tape arrows to direct the curbside flow. That tape is very visible on the asphalt and usually holds up well all day, yet it comes off easily after poll closing. Unfortunately the wet weather made the tape stick less well. Also, I found that they had set up the entrance arrow too close to the Accessible Parking area, which made it not good when a car was parked there. We'll get it right next time. 4) All the new signs for pointing out the doorbell seemed to do the job. Previously people often had problems seeing that small button on the stand. The doorbell hardware continues to works great. 5) This time we had no problems with people running over signs or cones. Unfortunately some curbside voters did come at a "carpool" time and got stuck in the "carpool" line, part of which they could have bypassed (very carefully) if they knew how; however these voters are unlikely to know about such things. We try to warn as many people as possible to avoid the "carpool" times, but some are just unaware. Maybe the BOE could start putting a warning on their public website to warn about "carpool" lines at school polling places. At SCES this year I found the afternoon *non-moving* carpool line ran all the way from the building's main door around the double loop in the parking lot, out the lot's entrance, down the long hill, and then out onto Granite Falls Blvd., where it continued with many cars stopped in the road. A voter definitely would not want to be stuck in that. 6) We did have one car that mistakenly parked in the curbside area, blocking the exit from that area. It turned out it belonged to a substitute teacher who had not gotten the word about not parking in that area. The Assistant Principal had notified all the teachers and other normal staff not to park there on Election Day, but the substitute did not get the word. Once I determined that the car did not belong to a voter, I notified the Assistant Principal; she tracked down the substitute teacher, who then moved her car. Fortunately all this occurred when no one needed to vote curbside. > TABULATOR < ========= 1) We had no Tabulator problems. With the small number of voters, we did not have to empty the bin before poll closing. When we did empty it at closing, we found all the ballots had stacked neatly in the blue box. 2) We had no runaway voters who managed to escape out the door before the Tabulator reported an error. People now seem much more willing to wait as directed until the Tabulator reports the status for a ballot. 3) We had a few overvotes; some chose to revote with a new ballot and some chose to just let the Tabulator ignore the overvoted contests. We had no cases in which a mismarked ballot was rejected by the Tabulator. At least this set of voters seemed know how to mark their ballots and use the Tabulator well. > AUTOMARK < ======== There were no AutoMARK problems. We had it well hidden and fenced off to make it hard to get to accidentally and then try to use it as the Tabulator. Last year we had it hidden, which turned out not to be enough. This year it was also fenced off; someone would have to move things to get to it. > SCANNER < ======= 1) There should be an easy way to demo/test the scanner, e.g., with matching and mismatching bar codes printed on the box or in some document. This would particularly help people who are new to the BT or haven't used the scanner in a long time. The BT Quick Guide says the scanner should be tested during Monday setup. 2) There is conflicting information about scanner charging. The Chief Judge Pocket Guide (page 9) and Ballot Table Quick Guide say plug it in Monday to charge overnight. But Training Resources > Barcode Scanner Box Label http://msweb03.co.wake.nc.us/bordelec/downloads/15precinctofficials/Resources/BCSlabel.jpg says the scanner is fully charged and says using the charger is optional. The latter may be true and probably the intent is just to say the scanner does not require a cord during Tuesday's work. However we always do what the Guides say and plug it in to charge overnight, even if it may really already be fully charged. > RECONCILIATION PROCESS < ============== ======= There were no reconciliation problems. Everything checked out exactly using the numbers provided by our lead Ballot Table Official. http://jgkhome.name/WakeBOE/Ballot_Count_Reconciliation_2022-05-17.htm > CAMPAIGNERS/OTHERS < ================== 1) We had one problem with a campaigner. He insisted that he should be able to use the restroom accessed thru the voting enclosure. I told him that was not allowed and explained the rule. Because this comes up every election, I had made a copy of Manual page 88 and taped it to the outside of the Media Center (our voting enclosure) entrance door. I highlighted in orange the bold-type sentence: "Campaigners may NOT enter the enclosure to access a restroom." I pointed him to the rule. He said because he had covered up all his political garb, he was not to be considered a campaigner. He said he was a voter. I asked him if he was coming inside to vote *now*, not just to use the restroom. No answer. I suspect he had already voted somewhere. He then got more insistent, asking for my name, which I readily gave him. He said he would report me to WRAL. (Since I didn't get home until late that night, I don't know if I made the news.) He did not seem at all interested in calling the BOE to verify what I was telling me. He left in a huff saying he had moved from California two years ago to get away from things like this. I have reported this restroom restriction problem many times in postmortems and elsewhere. Somehow the campaign officials need to be told (by the BOE?) before each election so they can warn their workers and plan how to handle things. I'm afraid that sooner or later something serious may come out of this situation. When I started this polling place in 2017 (it was a new polling place), the restroom problem came up right away. I asked the school officials if they would allow the campaign workers to use another restroom, perhaps providing an escort. As I expected, they said "NO". At the time there was a porta potty at the Town of Rolesville Main Street Park entrance at the end of the small gravel lot; that's a short hike from the school. I could point people to that facility. However that porta potty later disappeared. This Election Day someone told one of my Officials the porta potty was still there. On Wednesday I checked where I had seen it before. Still not there. I walked all the way back in the woods as far as the picnic table shed. I subsequently emailed JG Ferguson, the Rolesville Parks and Recreation Director. Because of my weekly litter pickup work, part of which is in Rolesville, I communicate with him often. He told me there was a porta potty in the area for now, but it's at the far end of the large gravel lot, in support of the Sanford Creek recreation field. However it's there only from March to October, which may be why I have never seen it at election time. I have sent all this information to the BOE to see if they and JG can work something out to leave the porta potty there thru November elections. Then at least I can point campaign officials to that porta potty. 2) In this election the campaign workers were less diligent about sign removal than in any past election at SCES. Before I left Tuesday night I saw many campaign signs still in the parking lot. I piled them by the Media Center door, per my past agreement with SCES. The next day I sent a note to my SCES contacts saying they could trash the signs if they were still there after a couple of days; that would meet the 36-hour requirement. > OBSERVERS < ========= 1) We had no Observers at all. That was a little surprising since we had precinct-specific observers in the last two elections. 2) No Observers or anyone else asked to watch the zero tape process in the morning or to view the procedures after the last voter had left the enclosure and we then did poll closing. Usually campaign workers or candidates come in to view/photograph the tape #4 we hang, but not this time. > VOTER COMPLAINTS/DIFFICULTIES/BEHAVIOR < ===== ================================ I heard of no voter problems. The voters all seemed to be in good spirits. People now seem well familiar with this polling place, its procedures, and equipment. > HARDWARE AND SUPPLIES < ======== === ======== 1) We didn't have to red tag anything. 2) We still got non-BOE calls and texts on the BOE cell phone, even though the phone is on the "Do Not Call" registry. 3) The bottom bar of one of the large (30" high) H-frames broke free of its weld. This is for one of the special signs I keep in my garage. I'll check with my BOE contact about when I can come in to get a replacement. One of the Quick-Stik signs by Rogers Road was vandalized. Someone just pushed it over, badly bending the rods. I can fix that, See http://jgkhome.name/WakeBOE/BOE_Supplies.txt for some other supplies comments from past elections that still apply. See http://jgkhome.name/WakeBOE/BOE_Wish_List.txt for my current general wish list. > HELP LINE < ==== ==== I or the HT Officials had to call the Help Line many times during the day. As far as I know, we always got thru immediately and then got good help. > DOCUMENTATION < ============= I won't repeat here my previous document comments or any links to them. > FORMS < ===== 1) The Chief Judge Packet Guide, page 9 under "Monday Meeting" says the CJ should mark attendance on the paysheet. The current paysheet does not have a specific place to do that for each voter. I think the old paysheet had checkboxes for both Monday and Tuesday, which seemed proper. I put some vertical lines on the paysheet so both Monday and Tuesday attendance could be shown explicitly. All our Officials were present full time on both days. 2) The current (2019) ATV really has a human factors problem. For UNA voters the RT Official must check the box of the party chosen by the voter as well as marking out extraneous ballot style barcodes. So far, so good. Then every voter must check the bottom, far-left gray box to agree to the one ballot style still shown and then sign the ATV to certify the text by all the boxes. That's where things go wrong. Most voters don't really read what they are certifying. Does anyone really disagree with that? They just mark the gray box as they are told to do by the RT Official and sign the ATV. Many (more than 10%, I'll bet) of the *non-UNA voters* also mark their registered party box in the area that is meant just for the RT Officials to mark for UNA voters. Of course we later ignore those extraneous marks. I think that at least the bottom, far-left box should be prechecked, just like all the boxes above it. Why force the Officials to require that box to be marked by voters? Voters really ignore the text by all the boxes, so why is that one not prechecked; it is going to be ignored as well. I think the troublesome checkbox should be split into two prechecked boxes to separate the UNA related stuff with its boxes from the non-UNA part. Have the first prechecked box say: "For partisan primary elections ONLY: I am registered as noted above." Have the second prechecked box say: "For partisan primary elections ONLY: *If I am registered Unaffiliated,* I will receive the following ballot:" Then below that second prechecked box have the party boxes, which are not prechecked. As before those are what the RT Official marks for UNA voters per each UNA voter's party choice. Finally, the voter signs in the existing Voter Signature box to certify all checkboxes and text above. Doing this split (adding a checkbox) should definitely not be a vertical space problem. There is a lot of available vertical space on the form. Side benefit: You can delete the no-longer-valid Green and Constitution parties. But there are probably several million blank 2019 ATVs in warehouse boxes that you want to use up before creating a new form. When you finally do get around to creating a new form, please consider the above suggestion. > PICKUP/DROPOFF < =============== 1) During Saturday pickup they took my name and precinct number at the front. Then somehow the 19-19 request got lost. After I had waited a long time in line, I finally got under the tent. The workers there found there was still no 19-19 cart. They checked with the warehouse and found no one in the warehouse had known to load the 19-19 cart. Meanwhile I was about to block a line of about half-a-dozen cars. I suggested that I move ahead from under the tent and park out of the way while they got things straightened out so the other cars could be handled. I did that. Five or ten minutes later the cart came and a special group of people handled the processing in my out-of-the-way space. 2) Monday afternoon supply pickup in Rolesville worked pretty well. I could see there was a little confusion getting things started in the cars ahead of me. By the time it was my turn, all seemed to be good. That's a very convenient pickup site for me. 3) Because our polling place is complicated, we were not able to finish packup by 9:00, to say nothing of getting from there to the dropoff site in Rolesville. So I had to drive to Raleigh for the dropoff at 1200 N. New Hope. I think that will always be the case except in very unusual circumstances. 4) Getting into the Raleigh dropoff site was a problem. This has been documented to the BOE elsewhere. Once at the delivery point, things went smoothly because the Precinct Officials had organized things well when packing my car. It was unusual that the dropoff receiving team has a different inventory list than the list I signed on Saturday. The delivery list did not include the precinct-specific items; it should have. Anyway, I delivered them as they should have been. 5) I wish the BOE had packed the ten pollbooks in two boxes (they fit) instead of three -- two boxes were pretty full and one was almost empty. My car is VERY full when packed to leave Tuesday night. It would not work to have three of the huge pollbook boxes; so we put everything in two and flattened the third. In the last election I had called the BOE to get permission to use only two boxes; they said I had to bring back all three, but could empty and flatten one to reduce the required volume. We did that again this election; otherwise there would have been a big problem. 6) Why can't the boxes of blank ATV forms be returned to the BOE by the movers instead of by the CJs? Usually I have at least two ATV boxes to pack in my car with all the other Tuesday night items. Is there some security concern about those blank forms? That seems unlikely. I think this time there were five ATV boxes that I had to deliver on Tuesday night. > PICTURES < ======== For some pictures and explanatory text about the 19-19 voting enclosure, voting equipment, etc., see https://photos.app.goo.gl/qiHEdjrxVoZ6gqdSA If you are unfamiliar with viewing Google Photo albums, http://jgkhome.name/Misc/Google_Photos.htm gives some hints. In particular, note how to use the "circle i" to view the full text beside each picture. Report written by Jeff Knauth, Chief Judge for 19-19 with input from the other Officials for this precinct