No more trudge to the polls

For more than 30 years, Helene DeFigh has awakened early each Election Day, headed to her precinct and readied the polling stations for incoming voters.

It's a duty, albeit paid, she has shared with hundreds of other poll workers throughout Snohomish County, none of whom will be needed Sept. 19, the date of this year's primary.

Instead, virtually all county voters will cast their ballots from their homes, their workplaces, schools, anywhere they can sit down with a pen or pencil to mark a ballot, seal and stamp an envelope, and drop it in the mail.

The county has switched to a mail-in balloting system that will no longer require hundreds of polling places to remain open from sunup to sundown. For voters with disabilities, one polling place — at the county Auditor's Office — will be available beginning Sept. 11.

DeFigh said she'll miss the action, the busyness of the day and, most of all, the chance to meet and greet friends and neighbors.

But elections have changed dramatically during the years DeFigh has worked at the polls, so it's no surprise they're changing again, she said.

What's being gained is efficiency, monetary savings and time. What's being lost, DeFigh said, is a form of civic pride that goes with voting at a polling place.

For the second time in Snohomish County's history, voters won't cast ballots at the polls during September's primary. The first occurred in 1995 during a two-year window the state Legislature had given counties to try out mail-in balloting.

The upcoming mail-in election was approved by the County Council in January, after the council's majority switched from the Republicans to the Democrats. For more than a year, council members had debated whether to switch to a mail-in system. The measure was voted down more than once last year.

But Jeff Sax's loss to Dave Somers last fall reversed the majority, and taking advantage of the switch, County Executive Aaron Reardon, also a Democrat, quickly raised the issue again.

For Democrats, it mostly has been a question of money and the growing preference of county voters for absentee ballots.

The county had been using electronic voting machines, and under a state law passed last year, that system required a paper backup to be used in the case of recounts by hand.

Though Snohomish County has had few problems with its electronic voting machines, the cost of adding the paper backup system was exorbitant: more than $1 million in equipment and $600,000 annually to store the machines. Machines were borrowed for spring elections to comply with the law.

"I think we're flushing money down the toilet," Councilman Dave Gossett, a Democrat, said last August.

But Republicans didn't mind spending the money as long as it ensured a voter's right to cast a ballot in privacy. Most vocal was Councilman John Koster, who has said he fears vote coercion around the dinner table. With him was Councilman Gary Nelson.

"No one will ever know who really filled out the ballot enclosed," Nelson said recently. "At least if I go into a polling place, I know it's one person, one vote. I don't have that security with respect to mail-in ballots."

More voters prefer mail

Statistics favor a mail-in system. Of the county's 340,000 registered voters, more than 60 percent already voted by mail, said county Auditor Bob Terwilliger. Even with no change in the voting system, Terwilliger's office had surmised that figure would increase to 70 percent by December 2006 and to 82 percent by December 2009. Across Washington, only five counties have yet to switch to a mail-in system: King, Pierce, Island, Klickitat and Kittitas, though each is discussing the change.

"I believe that if King County follows through, you're going to see the rest switch or the state Legislature make it mandatory," Terwilliger said recently. "For us, it's going to create a much more efficient election."

Despite the large percentage of votes by mail in previous elections, the Auditor's Office still has had to run as many as 130 polling locations, which required the use of 800 to 1,000 poll workers, who were each paid about $100 a day.

The machines weren't cheap, either. The county originally purchased 1,000 of them at $3,500 apiece, not including software. Some later were traded for other machines the county needed, and others were sold for $1,500 each.

Reading mail-in ballots and then counting electronic ballots left too much room for human error, Terwilliger said. With the new system, those verifying and reading votes will all be county employees with years of professional experience, Terwilliger said, and the work will be focused on just the one method.

Ballots will be collected, signatures verified by sight, and votes counted. Voters will be able to follow their ballots online. Voters with questioned ballots will be contacted, as they have been in other elections.

"Where I saw the most error in elections, it was usually because of an untrained poll worker," Terwilliger said.

Voters have the option of mailing in their ballots or dropping them off at one of 22 locations throughout the county, which should each be staffed by two people for security purposes beginning Sept. 11.

Workers at the collection sites will receive $16 an hour, and the county is currently taking applications for those jobs.

A loss of camaraderie

The loss of polling stations eliminates the camaraderie felt by those who worked and those who came to vote, said DeFigh, who remembers the high-curtained lever machines that eventually gave way to smaller, more compact electronic voting machines.

Regardless of the equipment, poll workers had a sense that they were doing something for the people and democracy, she said.

"Every time we moved, I went to sign up as a poll worker," she said. "It was something that I could do and something that I enjoyed."

Steve Olsen of Lynnwood, who worked for 10 years at the polls, fondly remembers the same faces who never missed an election.

"It was religious for them," he said, adding that voters often brought treats to poll workers. "You got to meet people in your neighborhood, but now people don't want to take that time to go to the polls."

Change has been part of elections since the country was founded, Olsen said, adding he is resigned to mailing in his ballot.

What's next? Terwilliger expects the use of the Internet to cast votes, especially for people in the military or living overseas. Snohomish County had been part of a select group to test out a Department of Defense system in 2004 until it was canceled.

One thing voters shouldn't lament the loss of is the "I voted" stickers that poll workers handed out. Much like the prize in a box of Cracker Jacks, those stickers now will be found inside each voter's packet, tucked next to the mail-in ballot.

Terwilliger said people should still wear them with pride.

Christopher Schwarzen: 425-783-0577 or cschwarzen@seattletimes.com