MACON, Ga. — An important part of being able to cast your ballot is the poll workers making it happen, but counties across the state still need more volunteers before early voting starts next month.
In Bibb County, they're looking for around 100 more poll workers to volunteer.
Eryn Rogers spoke to the Elections Officer for the Bibb County Board of Elections, Thomas Gillon, about how people can get involved.
Eryn: How many poll workers do you need?
Gillon: We want a total of just around 350. With the people who worked the last election, that was around 260 or so. We had a couple of dropouts, so we're going to get around 100 more from what we had in the August runoff.
Eryn: What are you doing to recruit these people?
Gillon: We had a lot of walk in traffic, and we've gotten a response from some of the schools to get some of the students in to work, and they're very good with technology, and they learn quick, so that's good. And that gives them community service and some extra spending money. Then on the Secretary of State's website, you can fill out a form there, and that gets sent to our office.
Eryn: You talked about spending money, so how much money does it pay to be a poll worker?
Gillon: The entry level poll worker is a clerk, and clerks make $100 to work election day, and we have mandatory poll worker training which takes about a half a day or so, and you get paid $50 training pay, so long as you work election day.
Eryn: When we're talking about training what all goes into it?
Gillon: We give them hands on training on the equipment, the poll pads, where voters get checked in, the ballot markers and printers, and the scanners when they put the ballots in and it records the ballot. We also talk about election law, what voters can and can't do in the polling place, what poll workers can and can't do, and things they can expect to see, what issues may arise, and how to deal with them.
Eryn: Compared to even 2 years ago, 4 years ago, you feel you have more poll workers now because more are needed, can you explain that?
Gillon: Due to the differences in equipment between now and the previous elections before 2020, we do require more poll workers, and for a presidential election like this, we'd normally have more poll workers available for line maintenance and so we can get more equipment out there to handle the large voting turnout.
Eryn: How did it work having to replace that experience once COVID hit and some of these older poll workers decided not to return?
Gillon: We certainly don't fault them for wanting to stay safe. Nobody is going to complain about that. We will miss them, though, because they had a wealth of experience, but we're doing more training than we did in prior ones. The managers and assistant managers are doing training this week just by themselves on some of the changes the state has made even since the last election.
Eryn: Are you seeing a surge in younger people wanting to help out this election?
Gillon: Yes, last election, we had some of the teachers come out and work with us because they were out of class at the time. We've gotten a lot better response for this election than we have in prior ones. I think a lot more people are interested in the election itself and the process of how it works, so that benefits us.
Eryn: How does it affect you all with the addition of more polling places, more early voting places, what now changes on you all's end?
Gillon: That would take pressure off of our office here which had been the only early voting location, so that may encourage more people to vote early, over and above the people who are voting absentee ballots. We want to have an excellent turnout, but if we can take some of the pressure off the polling locations on election day, that's not bad either.
Eryn: What do you need to be a poll worker?
Gillon: To be a poll worker, you only have to be 16-years-old, you do have to be a Bibb County resident, if you're not a Bibb County resident, go to your own county, you have to have a clean background record for at least 10 years, and you can't be closely related to a candidate who's name is on the ballot at the polling location where you work.
Eryn: The difference with what poll workers had to do with the old machines versus what they have to do now?
Gillon: There are a few pieces of equipment that we didn't have in the prior elections before 2020. The scanner that scans the paper ballot in, and we have to a have a poll worker monitor the scanner. Some polling places we've been having one scanner. Some have two, but for this election, we're going to have two scanners at each polling place. So, we need at least two people there that we would not have had before 2020. We have one person who monitors the vote review table where after a voter has printed out their ballot, we give them another opportunity to make sure the votes they filled out are the votes they wanted. We want to make sure the ballot is the way they wanted before they put it into the scanner, and we probably have more places to check in voters, so we have a couple reasons to have more poll workers.
Eryn: As it relates to poll workers, do you think it will be harder to recruit for something that's during the year as opposed to the summer when more people are off?
Gillon: That is a bit of an issue. We have some of the students who were not in class at all in the summer. They now have to be in class, even if it's just virtual, and some kids went back to college who had worked for us before, and some people who were temporarily laid off are back at work, so we lost a few people, but fortunately, not too many.
Eryn: You've been doing this a long time. Why is it important to volunteer as a poll worker? What personal benefit do you get from serving in that capacity?
Gillon: You serve your community, your county, by helping the process to ensure that everyone who wants to vote, gets to vote. This is an important election, I think all elections are important, but this one especially, so we want to have everyone eligible to vote to vote, and to do that we have to have poll workers -- whether it's early voting or at the poll place. So I encourage anyone who's interested to come over, talk to us, and we'll find a spot for you.
Poll worker training is October 5 to 9.