My Voting Experience

Wed, 08 Nov 2006 00:18:27 GMT

Four precincts... 10 Diebold voting machines... 50 people ahead of me... 45 minutes in line... five minutes to cast my ballot

I arrived at my polling location in Toledo, Ohio at 5:30 p.m. and saw a line that made me think of Cedar Point in the summertime. It wasn't really that bad but it was the first thing that sprang to mind. In my 15 years of voting in primary, special and general elections, I have never had to wait more than five minutes to cast my ballot. I feel it is my responsibility as an upstanding citizen to vote. As I waited to have my shot in front of the glowing screen of Diebold, I thought of those people who have waited hours upon hours to do what I take for granted as a US citizen.

My concern is this. The current setup in my neighborhood was walk in the door, go past the line to sign in, then go back to the end of line to wait to vote. If the number of people waiting their turn were a dozen or fewer, I don't think this system would have bothered me. Everyone in line would have remained in sight of the volunteer poll workers, who could have kept track of who was there. However that wasn't the case. There was closer to five times that many people. Anyone could have walked past the line, gone into the gymnasium for a couple of minutes without signing in, gotten back in line and then after 45 minutes of waiting, cast a ballot. I could have easily voted in ten different locations today if this was the norm all over Lucas County or the State of Ohio.

Did my vote count? Probably. Could there be people right now gaming the system making my vote worth less than theirs? Possibly. Do I have much confidence in our system of electing officials and passing referendums? Not really. With over 225 years of conducting elections, you would think this country would have a system worked out by now. I hope they will have it figured out for next year but I am not holding my breath.

adamh's OPML blog

My Voting Experience