Porter polls open to long lines
Al Guillen planned to cast an early ballot later in the week but decided to go ahead and vote Tuesday, the first day of in-person voting in Indiana.
Standing in a line outside the Porter County Administrative Center in downtown Valparaiso that made its way from a courtyard entrance on Napoleon Street around the corner to Indiana Avenue, Guillen, 74, of Valparaiso, said he decided to get voting over with.
“I went over to the (farmers) market because I was undecided and I said, ‘Nope, let’s vote. Let’s get things done,’ ” said Guillen who, like others standing in line, wore a mask because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Guillen, who’s retired from careers in human resources and insurance sales, said he first voted in a presidential election in 1970, less than a year after he returned from serving in the U.S. Army in Vietnam. He was 23.
He’s voted ever since and said he was anxious to “get my vote off my chest” and for it to count for the right person.
Guillen said he’d never seen a line like he did on Tuesday, which he said was “amazing,” and noted the importance of the election.
“The turnout’s going to be huge,” he said.
Twins Olivia and Grace Jewett, 20, of Valparaiso, both studying nursing at Indiana University Northwest, had been in line around 20 minutes and still hadn’t made it in the door.
The pair, who often an
swered questions in unison, said they voted early in the primary, too, though they weren’t thrilled with their choices on the ballot for their first presidential election.
“It’s kind of disappointing that these are the candidates. I think a lot of that is the consequence of the two-party system,” Olivia said.
Grace said she felt similarly, adding it’s been “a little of old white guys” year after year.
“The increasing of diversity is giving us hope but not in terms of this presidential election,” Olivia added.
The twins said they had done a little research on candidates further down the ballot, but the long line gave them time to look into them a bit more and they found many of the same people have appeared on the ballot year after year.
“It’s a bad thing because it’s like, ‘OK, you’re still here,’ ” Grace said.
“But we’re still going to vote because a lot of nursing is advocacy and policy,” Olivia said. “This is the first step.”
Inside the administrative center, a poll worker, clearly too busy to answer questions, said voters had been coming through door “nonstop.”
By early Tuesday afternoon, 281 voters had cast ballots in Valparaiso; 257 in Portage; 186 in Chesterton; 107 in Union Township; and 87 in Hebron.
The line for early voting started around 8 a.m., half an hour before the doors open, and quickly made its way around the administrative center, said Sundae Schoon, director of Elections and Voter Registration, who added she loved seeing so many people show up to vote.
“It’s exciting because that’s your goal, to get people to vote,” she said.
Her office also sent out 11,841 mail-in ballots and received 5,031 of them back so far.
The last time she saw such heavy turnout was for the 2016 presidential election, when the line for early in-person voting, inside at the time, wrapped down the hall and to the health department.
Schoon was pleased to see the numbers so far for
the general election compared to low turnout in the primary, which was pushed to June because of the pandemic.
“It’s just sad. We do all that work for 26% of the voters,” she said.
Early voting ends at noon on Nov. 2. For more information, goto porterco.org /1111/Early-Voting.