Vote Centers – Virginia 2013
Asking The Right Questions
What is a Vote Center?
• A Vote Center is nothing more than a
polling location where any voter in the
jurisdiction can go to vote, regardless
of the location of their residence (with
the county or jurisdiction). With Vote
Centers, there is no longer a “wrong
place” to vote within the jurisdiction.
Vote Centers – Democracy or Disaster?
• Wonderful idea when done right
• Disastrous when done wrong
Advantages for Voters
• Voters have a better chance of
knowing how to find a polling place
since they can go to any Vote Center in
the jurisdiction
• Sites are usually in major traffic
locations known by voters.
• Since voters can vote from anywhere it
significantly reduces provisional ballots
(meaning more likely to be counted)
Advantages for Voters
• Voters get to vote on any and all races
• Initial indications are that turnout
improves but this may be the “bounce”
effect of new process.
• Political parties and candidates benefit
by receiving updated voter information
throughout the day
Considerations That Affect Success
• Laws need to be changed to allow use
• Gaining elected officials & legislators
acceptance is necessary
• Training requirement is significantly
increased: Train for 8 hours all in one
day.
• Training has to be specialized rather
than generalized for specific duties of
Vote Center personnel.
Considerations That Affect Success
• Experience doing Early Voting is useful
• Use of DRE equipment is an advantage
in urban areas: any location with
hundreds or thousands of ballot styles
is more difficult & more expensive with
paper ballots but can be done with
Ballot on Demand (BOD) systems.
• Accurately estimating equipment &
supplies essential to success - failure
Considerations That Affect Success
• Logistics have to be handled differently
and forces some changes in
distribution of equipment & setup
• Use moving company or similar to
transport high volumes of equipment &
materials
• Essentially requires use of T-1
telephone connection to allow
communications from Center to HQ
(point is that this is more expensive)
Considerations That Affect Success
• Electronic pollbooks are key to success
• County HAS to have appropriate
computer server network and
backbone to handle the volume of
computer inquiries on ED. (Server farm
and multiple units)
• Initial costs for equipment/services to
implement Vote Centers can be
substantial but likely to pay for
themselves
Warning
• Problems can be more significant if
difficulties arise. Training &
implementation difficulties can result in
severe voter complications (read up on
Denver’s experience)
• Vote Centers may not be appropriate
or useful to smaller jurisdictions &
even some larger ones
Something to Ponder
• A dentist and a manicurist married.
They fought tooth and nail.
How Many Per Vote Center?
• Colorado law establishes that there
must be one Vote Center per every
10,000 of population
• Lessons learned: Establish another
Vote Center within relatively short
distance from another so that if one is
overflowed, nearby is available.
• Larimer County started with 30 Vote
Centers instead of 153 precinct
locations. Now uses 24 Centers
Numbers to consider
• Larimer County Colorado started Vote
Centers (from 2004 & 2012):
• Population: 275,000 now 300,000
• Registered Voters: 200,000 now 240,000
• Active Voters: 160,000
now 200,000
• Nearly 50% of voters use permanent mailin balloting in 2004 Now 70% mail
• Polls open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Money & Budgets
• Initial costs can be high but savings
eventually pay for most of it.
• Analyze the costs for:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Multiple servers (server farm such as Citrix)
T-1 lines
Integrating ePollbooks and computers
Training costs
No real savings on voting equipment initially
Paper will complicate your ability to do this well
Ballot on Demand (BOD) systems help but will
need more than you think
Something to Ponder
• You are stuck with your debt if you
can’t budge it.
Design & Layout
• You have to design to fit your space
and traffic flow of voters
• Traffic flow literally so Vote Centers can be
found & used by voters
• Traffic flow of voters inside the Vote
Center itself so you can handle high
volumes of people voting at the same time
Design & Layout
• Factors:
• Size of facility
•Location of facility
•Adequate parking for high volumes – at
least 80 vehicles at one time
•Square footage important minimum
1,500sf to 3,000sf
• Space Configuration
• Compliant and friendly for voters with
access needs:parking & inside space
Technology Needed
• T-1 lines purchased and installed – test
and re-test with computers to assure
working
• Computers – Vote Center stations (get
all the old county computers turned in
for newer computers and use the older
in Vote Center.) And then cycle out the
“old” old and next election cycle use
“new” old
Technology Needed
• Make sure ePollbooks can be used
quickly – modify to assure quick
response – use reduced VR data.
Processing large numbers of voters has
to be done quickly.
• Servers and More Servers – Has to be
able to handle the volumes. Backups
to backups so never down.
Added Benefits
• When voter arrives at ePollbook,
he/she is given instant credit for voting
on the master pollbook at HQ.
• Allows election staff to monitor Vote
Center operations from HQ & to
determine, from a central location,
what is needed in the form of supplies,
ballots, etc. at the various locations
Poll Watchers Benefit
• Allows for poll watching to be
simplified. Electronic list of all who
have and have not voted is developed
for all precincts every 2 hours & sent
electronically to any campaign
requesting the information.
• Campaign or party “GOTV” efforts
immediately enhanced rather than
having all scattered throughout to
gather the information.
Something to Ponder
• If you don’t pay your exorcist, you can
get repossessed.
Stations in Vote Center
• Greeter
• Computer Station
• Provisional Table
• Ballot Table
• Voting
• Exit
Training, Training, and more Training
• Pollworkers trained for SPECIFIC tasks
rather than general functions. All are
trained for 3 hours in the morning
beginning at 8 a.m. and then spend
the afternoon being trained for the
specific function they are to handle
Problems: Spelled D I S A S T E R
• Denver Colorado 2006
• Douglas County Colorado 2006
However: successes in:
Several Colorado counties
Lubbock, Texas,
Henderson, Nevada
Indiana (pilot projects)
And others: See Professor Bob Stein at
Rice University: stein@rice.edu
Something to Ponder
• Local Area Network in Australia: The
LAN down under
Q&A
• Questions?
• Comments?
Presentation by Doug Lewis, Executive
Director, The Election Center, Houston,
Texas. dlewis@electioncenter.org
281-293-0101