The poll watcher: Democracy is alive

My husband and I spent three days volunteering as poll watchers in Maricopa County. The training readied us with rules and regulations, procedures for encounters with voter intimidation, long lines, broken voting machines and people behaving badly. They warned that Arizona is an open carry state.

But what I discovered during our time as poll observers is that, for all the shrieking and pearl clutching, democracy is very much alive and well and working with almost heartbreaking if imperfect beauty, nothing at all like what people are hearing from a steady diet of media hysteria.

The poll workers we encountered were diverse, quirky and ordinary. Their personalities ran the spectrum from chatty grandma to aging hippie to grim Marine. To a person, they were dead serious about their jobs, clearly dedicated to ensuring that people were able to cast their votes to the maximum extent possible and that the process had maximum integrity. I was struck by how important it was to each of them. There may be millions of people in America who think voting is pointless or stupid or a joke; but to the three dozen or so poll workers we encountered in Maricopa County, voting is a sacred and important duty.

Arizona allows early voting so we were assigned as observers from Halloween through election day. It was a rare opportunity to connect with an America we do not often see. People of every possible age, race, ethnicity passed in and out of makeshift voting spaces in strip malls, church rec rooms and fraternal lodges. I have an entirely new appreciation for the extraordinary diversity and range of tattoos. Some people needed assistance, others breezed through. But each was accorded respect, patience and kindness by every poll worker we encountered.

Here are just some of the observations I’d want to share with those cynically maligning poll workers, disgracefully attempting to undermine the public’s confidence in the electoral process. I saw one spend eight hours cheerfully asking everyone dropping off ballots whether they were signed and dated as required. By my informal count, at least three dozen were saved by his efforts. I saw a gruff inspector, the person in charge, sit with a Spanish speaking family for 45 minutes patiently sorting out an issue to make sure that they could cast their ballots. I saw a room full of harried people pause, smile and clap each time an enthusiastic poll worker proclaimed “firsttime voter!” I saw staffers explain how provisional ballots work when some sort of problem arose. I saw every single person’s identification checked and verified.

I saw a visually impaired man become deeply frustrated when the only ADAcompliant voting terminal was broken; and I saw the inspector ensure that the man was able to vote before leaving. When the voting booths could not accommodate a disabled woman, I saw staffers clear a table for her and create a human privacy shield. I watched late on election day as a flurry of concern arose about whether it was OK to use Sharpies instead of pens, and saw the issue calmly resolved ( Sharpies are OK).

And I saw that the few people who showed up but were not registered to vote in Maricopa County were told they could not vote there. This occurred only after lengthy efforts to ascertain whether the person was, in fact, registered. In most cases, those people walked in either knowing they weren’t registered or uncertain about whether they were. I saw poll workers patiently explain, that, no, being registered in Iowa does not count. And no, Arizona does not have sameday registration and, yes, maybe it should but that is above my pay grade.

And finally, at the end of the day, when the voters were gone and the voting booths pulled down, I saw poll workers following protocols to the letter, moving ballots out of the machines and into official containers that were then sealed and ziptied for transport. I saw exhausted poll workers, who’d been on the job for 16 hours, drinking quite possibly the worst coffee on the planet, doing exactly what they were supposed to be doing.

Poll observing may be the least sexy aspect of the entire voting process. We show up and present our credentials and hang out in a designated Observer Chair watching humanity stream in and out. I’m not sure what we expected, but what we found was interesting, boring and uplifting. Everyday Americans doing the most patriotic and important thing imaginable. They deserve our respect, praise and thanks.

Cynthia Koehler is a Northern California environmental attorney.

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