Tuesday, November 4, 2008

Say goodbye to those voting booths Washington!

11/4/08 marked the last time that WA state voters, specifically in King and Pierce counties, would be voting at actual polling places with voting booths and Accuvote machines etc.

I have volunteered as an election official judge and inspector for the past 8 years and it has been a totally rewarding, if sometimes trying experience. Our state will still have drop box locations and AVU machines (electronic voting machines) and therefore there will most likely still be volunteer opportunities for me in the future, but it won’t be the same.

Some things that I'll miss -
  • George. Elderly, sweet, quiet, loyal George. Precinct 43-1358, thank you very much.

  • The commraderie of the poll judges. Every voting day, rain or shine we would be there at dawn getting things set up,working together throughout the day, solving problems before King county even had a chance to send a troubleshooter our way. I'll miss the coffee/donut/pizza runs too. And the good laughs we had and some voters' expense.

  • The voters. From the committed neighborhood folk who always made a point to vote no matter how obscure the ballot initiative, to the folks just trying to save postage by dropping off their absentee ballots, I'll miss each and every voter. Yes, even annoying-as-hell "7:45 guy".

  • The process. From the oath of judges at 6AM to the laborious process of giving Accuvote, Provisional, and Absentee voter totals in the evening tally. Democracy at work. A beautiful thing.

They picked a good election to go out on - we had 2,000 people vote in our polling place on 11/4/08. And that's not counting the hundreds of people that came through to drop off their absentee ballots. The energy was magnetic. Awesome way to end things.

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