4 ms·
Well to inject a bit of optimism here let me tell how of how it "just works" in the second largest city in New Hampshire. There are several "wards" in the city
by simonsarris 14y ago
Well to inject a bit of optimism here let me tell how of how it "just works" in the second largest city in New Hampshire.
There are several "wards" in the city, and each contains a school that is the voting location. Outside of each location will be people holding signs of all candidates, but all they said this morning are things like "Happy voting" and "Thank you for voting."
Inside the location there will be about 8 lines with last name letters. A-D and E-H, I-M, etc. If your last name was Dorette you would get into the A-D line. This is one bottleneck, but it resolves very quickly. You say your name, they find your name and cross it off, and you are handed a paper ballot.
With the paper ballot you then wait in a second line until a booth (containing nothing but a marker pen and writing surface) is free. There are about 16 of these booths, with privacy screens behind them.
If all the booths are filled you will have to wait, BUT if you do not mind people being able to possibly see your vote you are welcome to go to a temporary booth, that is just a series of lunch tables with cardboard dividers. Less privacy, far more seats. Maybe 30-40 people can fill out ballots at once at the ward I was in.
You fill out your ballot with a black marker and bring it to the end of the room where there is a single machine. This machine does nothing but take your ballot and scan it, so the line here processes near instantly. The ballots are kept to be recounted by hand if need be, and most importantly, the machine portion of voting is not a bottleneck.
It went very smoothly today.
- morsch 14y agoThanks for sharing what I'm sure is a fairly normal experience. It sounds very similar to the last time I voted (also in a school building), except I never experienced a line longer than, say, 2 persons -- I guess we have more, smaller locations/voter --, and of course there was no computer at the end, you just put your ballot in the box. And there were no people picketing near the location, and nobody thanked me for voting. Well, that's not true, the people inside said thanks (and so did I). Representatives of all parties are present when the votes are counted (and recounted). We get the results in the evening, 2 or 3 hours after the elections close. It's not entirely comparable since our ballot is quite simple, two pages with large letters, it takes about a minutes to fill out with two crosses in the right place. From what I understand you often vote on loads of things at the same time and it takes a while to fill out correctly.
- notatoad 14y ago>Outside of each location will be people holding signs of all candidates isn't it illegal to campaign within a certain radius of a polling place?
- lps41 14y agoThat would be a state-by-state law. There is no such law in Maryland as far as I know.
- joshuacc 14y agoI voted in Maryland this morning, and there was a sign about 25 feet from the door marking the spot where electioneering becomes illegal.
- LogicHoleFlaw 14y agoIn my experience the campaigners are instructed by the officials running the voting site what that radius is and stay outside of it.
- amalag 14y agoVirginia is similar, with optional machine voting.
- slashedzero 14y agoMy district in California was exactly like this, sans the people out front. This being the downtown of the capitol city, too.