Officials working to recruit more poll workers
All 180 sites could open for election, if staffed
Milwaukee election officials hope to be able to open all 180 polling sites in November’s presidential election — if conditions with the coronavirus pandemic allow.
A second surge in coronavirus cases and a level of public fear that drives people away from working the polls — as happened in the April 7 election — would seriously hamper that effort, outgoing Milwaukee Election Commission Executive Director Neil Albrecht told members of the Common Council on Monday.
Unlike the April 7 election, when the city was losing election workers by the day, Albrecht said, the city has more
time ahead of the November election to recruit people to work the polls. He’s optimistic that will put the city in a better position.
“The contingency plan is we may need to consolidate sites again, but ... certainly nothing close to five” election centers, which the city experienced in April, he said.
Those five centers, down from its usual 180 voting sites, forced residents to stand in line for hours in the midst of the pandemic to cast their ballots.
After the election, some members of the Common Council said they wanted answers about why the city had cut its voting sites so drastically and why absentee ballots did not reach voters or did not reach them in time for the election.
Common Council members got the chance to ask those questions during Monday’s Judiciary and Legislation Committee meeting, though no representative of the U.S. Postal Service was present to provide answers.
Committee members also approved a measure to inform residents across the city on ways to register to vote and request an absentee ballot in upcoming elections in addition to Mayor Tom Barrett’s appointment of Claire WoodallVogg to succeed Albrecht.
The measures will go before the full Common Council at its next meeting on June 16.
About 18,800 people voted in-person in Milwaukee on election day and about 76,360 absentee ballots were counted in April’s election, which included contests for Milwaukee County executive and Milwaukee mayor and a host of other local races, in addition to state Supreme Court.
Albrecht said his office contacted the U.S. Postal Service to understand why voters were experiencing significant delays, sometimes seven to 10 days, from the time they requested a ballot to the time they received the ballots.
There was also a glitch in the statewide voter registration database that municipalities use to process absentee ballot requests, he said. That malfunction made it appear that about 2,700 people in Milwaukee that had requested absentee ballots had been sent a ballot.
He said the state determined that a municipality could not have known that error occurred.
“If there is any silver lining into this aspect of a system failure it is that about 1,700 of those individuals were either re-issued ballots and returned those ballots or voted at drive-up, early voting or voted at their election site on election day,” Albrecht said.
That still means that a system error in the state database contributed to about 1,000 people not being able to vote in that election, he said.
Albrecht said his office is also aware of voters in the city receiving ballots for the incorrect ward.
“We are looking at how we can expand on our own quality control systems to prevent that kind of human error with regard to the assembling of absentee ballots,” he said. “That was most certainly an error that occurred within the Election Commission and I would take full responsibility for that.”
Albrecht also reiterated the challenges associated with maintaining election staffing as the pandemic drove people into their homes for fear of becoming infected, saying keeping staff was “like holding water in our hands.”
There were about 1,400 confirmed election workers with a plan to bring on an additional 600, he said, but at one time the commission had fewer than 300 confirmed workers.
The decision to have five voting centers came from the shortage of election workers, the need to work with the Health Department to protect election workers and voters, and the need to operate the sites in a way that wouldn’t compromise the administration of the election, he said.
He also called it “abhorrent” that people had to stand in line for hours to vote during a pandemic, saying, “We were asked to do the impossible, which was to provide safe, in-person voting during a pandemic.”
The Election Commission is working on a campaign to recruit younger election workers, based on the assumption that the pandemic will still pose a risk to retired people who have historically worked the polls, he said. They’re changing their recruitment strategy to reach out to high school and college students and youth organizations.
Committee OKs Woodall-Vogg as new election commission executive director
The committee also voted in favor of Mayor Tom Barrett’s pick to lead the city’s Election Commission going forward.
Woodall-Vogg would succeed Albrecht, who announced at the end of last month that he planned to retire after 15 years with the office and eight years at its helm. Albrecht, 58, previously told the Journal Sentinel that he decided to retire now because the period of his appointment is nearing its end.
Woodall-Vogg, who currently serves as the commission’s business systems administrator, said her biggest focus will be on poll worker recruitment with the goal of operating as many early voting and election day polling locations as possible in the August and November elections.
She said it’s necessary to use social media to recruit poll workers and to conduct training virtually.
Altered SafeVote plan moves forward
Instead of mailing absentee ballot applications to registered voters, an updated SafeVote program would have the city mail information to households on how to register to vote and request an absentee ballot.
Wisconsin election officials agreed last month to send absentee ballot applications to most voters for the fall election, though that plan could face hurdles. The program at the city would complement that effort and also include a mailing ahead of the August and November elections, according to the city.
Residents would be encouraged to use the myvote.wi.gov website to register to vote and request absentee ballots.
Those who want a physical absentee ballot application, don’t have internet access, need assistance with the MyVote website or need help scanning their photo identifications could go to libraries for assistance.
“This is powerful, this is a really unique opportunity” because it will give information to people who aren’t yet registered to vote, said Ald. Marina Dimitrijevic, the measure’s lead sponsor.
Albrecht said it’s necessary to provide residents with community-based resources like the libraries to ensure that people who don’t have internet access or the ability to capture an image of their photo IDs are still able to absentee vote by mail, which he called the “safest voting mechanism.”
Albrecht said the mailing would cost a maximum of about $264,000. Then there is the cost of more people voting absentee, which can cost several dollars per person, he said.
Funding sources available include federal CARES Act dollars and the potential for grants aimed at preventing COVID-19 from infringing on voting, he said.
He said the goal is for 80% of voters to submit absentee ballots by mail, which he said could cost anywhere from $750,000 to $1 million to shift from inperson voting to voting by mail.