Milwaukee Poll Workers Risk COVID-19 for Presidential Election

MILWAUKEE- On Nov. 3, thousands of people around the U.S woke up early to set up machines and tables for the presidential election. Let me be more specific, I woke up early to set up machines and tables for the presidential election.  

This year in Milwaukee, election inspectors were in high demand because 178-polling locations showed up in the city. One of the 178 polling locations was the Barack Obama School of Career and Technical Education located on 5075 N Sherman Blvd.   

At six o’clock on election day, I found myself walking into the doors of that location to see how it felt to be a part of the election process.  

When I walked in, more than 15 people were waiting for instruction. The first thing that caught my attention when I entered the room was the plexiglass. For previous presidential election inspectors, this was a new experience that caused them anxiety.  

According to Georgia, who has been working the election polls for four years, she said that this was an expected addition.  

“I have been working the election polls for more than four years,” said Georgia. “I have to ask them to repeat themselves already but now that we have plexiglasses, I can’t hear them at all. I guess it’s better than getting the Rona.”   

This year, the City of Milwaukee Election Commission added personal protective equipment at voting sites to ensure the protection of citizens. The box included masks, gloves, and sanitizers, that was open to the public. 

The chief Inspector assigned people to sanitize places that would be high touch areas. Bottles filled with a lemon smell that killed my nostrils were plastered all around the room for inspectors to use. Dori, a fellow inspector, and clean freak felt like the Milwaukee Election Commission cared more about safety this time around. 

After reading the manual for a whole night, I was happy to be assigned as a receiver for the first half of the day. My job was to make sure every voter had an acceptable form of identification with them.  I would then find them in the polling book, and they would receive their ballot to vote. 

It was the receiver’s job to make sure that the absentee voters were able to vote if they changed their minds about absentee. I think that was the most interesting thing about this job because of the controversy of absentee voting happening right now.  

When we had an absentee voter, we had to make sure they still had their absentee and didn’t send it in. I had to make sure that if they did send it, that it would make it in on time. To check the absentee voters, we used the online tracker to see if the mail made it to its destination.   

It was difficult for me to make some of the calls for the absentee voters because, until 8 p.m.  they still had the opportunity to turn it in. According to Myvote.WI.gov, voters could send their absentee votes in until Nov. 3 at eight in the evening. 

Around the afternoon, we had more absentee voters come in to vote in person. I asked voters why they didn’t just turn their absentee votes in, but multiple people felt like their vote wouldn’t have counted after watching people talk on the news.  

Later that night, I thought about situations that certain people had to go through to vote. How many people probably thought that their absentee wasn’t going to matter because of a politician or media person? How many people who were going to quarantine and send in their ballot, instead went out to vote? How many people could have been infected?  

What would you do to make sure your vote is counted?