ConFigures

Standby for Special Election; Pollbook UI problems

Nobody’s called me yet, but I’m on standby to act as a closing judge in a special election in Maryland tonight (Maryland seems to have these from time to time, no big deal; there was one in April, this one for a vacancy on the county council, another one coming up in June). I went to training on Friday for this, and was happy to see that they’ve already updated/clarified the training/procedures since I was a closing judge (and gave feedback) in February. The trainers, Tracy, Janet, and Keith, were friendly and helpful. The only thing I’d like to see changed now in the written training materials would be a little more emphasis on pairing with members of the opposite party (the trainers did express this verbally, at least).

However, at the training, I got my first crack at actually trying out the electronic pollbooks (Diebold machines where one checks to see if a prospective voter is registered in the district in which one is working). That interface is in serious need of improvement. For instance, when searching by address, it goes from saying “TOO MANY” (type in more letters to narrow), to listing only one name when the first digit of the house number is typed in, to “NOT FOUND IN STATE” when only some house numbers are typed in, to finally listing the selections again when all house numbers have been typed in. It seems likely that would-be voters will be turned away (or made to vote provisionally) erroneously, given the potential for confusion in the path for getting to their listings.