Photo by ericschoon
If you recall, the turnout for the primary election in April was, well, abysmal. While the turnout for the general election in November was certainly better, it by no means set any election day records.
According to a report from the Office of the District of Columbia Auditor, there’s a lot of room for the D.C. Board of Elections’ election day preparation and administration to be improved. Among the areas of improvement: Hiring more reliable workers, making polling places more accessible, updating outdated equipment, and more.
On election day in November, the Auditor’s report found that, of the 89 precincts agents visited, 23 of them did not have the minimum number of workers in each position, mostly due to a high percentage of “no shows.” In the April primary 10.3 percent of assigned workers failed to show up on Election Day, while 8.8 percent failed to report to their assigned polling places during the November election.
The auditor’s report also revealed that many polling precincts were not fully accessible for people with disabilities. According to the report, 37 of the 89 precincts visited weren’t fully accessible.
But perhaps the most obvious conclusion from the report is that the DCBOE’s voting machines are outdated and need to be updated. According to the report, the DCBOE needs to “prepare [logic and accuracy] testing on more than 400 machines.”
You can read the full report below:
