Cathy Petroff: The Importance of Poll Workers, Florida

In early 2020 (just weeks before the pandemic), Smithsonian staff and their storytelling partners at the Peale, Baltimore, traveled to multiple states in the U.S. to ask residents of those states about voting experiences, the current state of American democracy, what issues brought them to the polls, how they made a difference in their communities, and what Americans' civic responsibilities were, among other complex questions.

Cathy Petroff: Probably the most amazing part of the preparation for an election is that it begins right after the previous election. Because all of the materials have to be collected, they have to be reorganized, packed again in boxes. And then begins the process of not only finding poll workers to work, clerks to be in charge of a precinct, learning and getting ready to train all of those people.

(00:31) But then you have to find places to do the training in each of the different communities. We also have to find polling places, places that are willing to give up their facilities on an evening and all day one day, and essentially have their life disrupted for the day of an election.

(00:52) Before an election day actually happens, every poll worker puts in a minimum of two hours of training. And depending on the position, it could be three hours or seven hours, depending on what the position is.

(01:05) But on election day itself, our day begins by 6:00 AM. We have to be at our polling location by 6:00 AM, ready to go with everything we need for the day, any food that we want to eat, any medicine, all of that kind of stuff we have to have with us.

(01:23) We have spent time, typically the night before, setting up our polling location. So everything is in place, all we have to do is get out our tools and put them in place and be ready by 7:00 AM when the voters come. And in my particular precinct, every time they are lined up at the door by 7:00 AM. They are ready to roll.

(01:45) Throughout the day, people come and go. In voting, we have book inspectors who greet the voters, check their IDs, issue them a ballot, or send them to somebody who can issue them a ballot or help them to vote.

(01:59) We have a voting equipment operator who monitors them putting their ballot in the machine, making sure that each one does get counted and everything is fine before the voter goes out the door.

(02:12) At 7:00 PM, whoever is in line does get to vote, even if it may be after 7:00 PM. But nobody else can come and get in line after that 7:00 PM time.

(02:24) Once the last voter left the building, then we begin the process of verifying the election, accounting for every ballot that we had received, putting everything back where it belonged. And that's a very important thing too, not just throwing everything in the tub.

(02:45) And, then the clerk and one other poll worker needs to put all of that stuff back in the car, and drive them back to election headquarters. Where there's a very systematic procedure, with Sheriff's deputies involved, to take and make sure that you've got everything that you had left with when we issued the supplies.

(03:09) So it's a very long day. Minimally, to arrive by 6:00 AM, clerk and the person riding with them may not get home till 9:00 or 10:00, depending on the length of time, the length of the line at the election operations center. It's a long day.

Asset ID: 2022.37.07.a-b
Themes: Elections, Voting Security, Voting Rights, Poll Workers, Participation, Process, Ballots
Date recorded: January 9, 2020
Length of recording: 0:03:31
Related traveling exhibition: Voices and Votes: Democracy in America
Sponsor or affiliated organization: Polk County History Center, Bartow, Florida, in conjunction with Florida Humanities
More information or related assets: https://polk-county.net/events/event-details/2020/10/23/history-center/new-smithsonian-institution-exhibit-opens-voices-votes-democracy-in-america. See also, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Ox1BNRtNI0