MADISON, Wis. (SPECTRUM NEWS) – Wisconsin's spring election is only a week away and several towns and cities across the state don't have enough poll workers to offer in-person voting on election day.
The Wisconsin Elections Commission recently surveyed local clerks across the state to find out how many poll workers they lost ahead of the election.
“Right now, what we're doing is crossing our fingers and hoping like heck and we're going to have to answer voters in these communities when the clerk goes with their key at 6:30 in the morning to open up the polling site and there are no poll workers,” Commissioner Ann Jacobs said during a Tuesday morning meeting.
The survey found 111 municipalities are short 671 poll workers, leaving them without enough help to offer in-person voting.
Another 126 municipalities lack 2,713 poll workers which make them unable to staff all of their desired polling sites.
There does not appear to be a geographical trend when it comes to a lack of volunteers. Towns and cities scattered across the state are facing shortages.
State employees were sent an email Monday asking for volunteer poll workers as the commission also works toward coming up with an emergency reserve of help.
In the meantime, local clerks are being urged to start looking at absentee ballot envelopes as they come in.
Poll workers are not allowed to open absentee ballots until the election, but they can start alphabetizing them by ward to make counting them easier.
“I did reach out to the City of Milwaukee,” Jacobs said. “They're anticipating a minimum of approximately, and this was an estimate, right now three days to process the ballots given the number of ballots and the requirements for safety and the like.”
Right now, towns and cities are still expected to meet the deadline for reporting results but they can extend their count if they give the public notice.
Absentee ballots can still be requested by mail until Thursday, April 2, leading some commissioners to raise concerns about clerks getting ballots back before the polls close at 8 p.m. on Tuesday.
“We have to have a realistic appraisal as to how many tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of votes are not going to get back in time to even be counted on the [April 7] and we in good faith can say that it's going to be a fair and safe election under those circumstances,” Commissioner Mark Thomsen said.
Though first class mail generally takes about two days, in the past the U.S. Postal Service has advised voters plan for up to seven days each way when requesting and sending back absentee ballots.
“Should we give them some different guidance to try to avoid what Commissioner Thomsen was talking about where depending on getting one day service, maybe it doesn't happen, should we actually as a commission suggest that in those last couple of days you would be better off to deliver it by hand,” Elections Commission Chair Dean Knudson asked during the meeting.
Commissioners talked about ways they could let voters know of options besides mailing their ballots back but made no final decisions leaving it to commission staff to look into ways to get a message out.