Nearly a year after ballot and staff shortages across Boston left many residents unable to vote in the general election, state officials have responded with new legislation to ensure such an incident does not happen again, but local activists and politicians who are still sore about the subject have questioned whether recent changes are enough to heal the damage.
The City of Boston recently placed an advertisement on its website to attract residents to apply for paid positions as election officers and interpreters. The interpreters do not have to be Boston residents or eligible to vote, according to Brian McNiff, spokesman for Secretary of State William Gavin, adding the age requirement to be a poll worker had been lowered last year from 18 to 16. The average poll worker is 72.
“Ballots were only a problem in a few precincts,” McNiff said. “The city and towns have a pretty good idea of the number of ballots required. Boston had enough. It was just that transportation was a problem.”
Last November, 30 precincts in Dorchester, East Boston, Jamaica Plain, Mattapan and Roxbury reported ballot shortages, provoking activists to condemn what they considered an infringement of human rights in predominately minority areas.
“To me, this is a basic violation,” said Grace Ross, the Green-Rainbow Party nominee in the 2006 gubernatorial election and current nominee for the Worcester City Council. “How are we supposed to have a democracy if people can’t vote?”
City election code allowed for the distribution of only enough ballots for 50 percent of registered voters at each polling precinct, with additional ballots available to be delivered if necessary, The Boston Globe reported. Ross called this policy unacceptable.
“This is a fundamental issue of whether we understand the electoral process in terms of the voter or if we look at it as a horse race between candidates,” Ross said. “We need to go back to having the elections being about the voters, because that’s what matters.
“The people in charge need to pay attention to details and have a good communication system,” she continued. “They need to assume that things go wrong in an operation this size and plan enough in advance.”
Touch-screen technology in some polling stations forced workers to deal with unexpected technical problems, she said, adding that more election-day volunteers and training are necessary to prevent such mishaps in the future.
Because many shortages occurred in areas populated predominantly by minorities, some experts pointed out that the ballot shortages were an unnecessary headache for a city with historically rocky race relations.
“The failure to provide adequate ballots or access for voters is serious,” said Boston University professor George Bachrach, a former state senator. “Most voters will not wait or return to vote, so they have essentially been disenfranchised. . . . If this happens disproportionately in minority or poorer sections of the city, you have skewed the election toward certain candidates.”
To improve the voting process and eliminate problems, Bachrach said the state must first develop clearer lines of communication and improved coordination.
“The remedy is pretty straightforward: better planning and communication,” he said. “Every election department has access to voter statistics by precinct and should be able to accurately ‘guesstimate’ turnout. They should recruit sufficient city employees, and if necessary, recruit and train volunteers. This is not rocket science. This is basic governmental planning.”