ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WROC) — The Monroe County Board of Elections is busy preparing for November’s general election. Election commissioner Lisa Nicolay said it’s been very busy the past few months with a strong focus on making it easy for everyone to be able to vote. She said nearly 30,000 absentee ballot applications have already been sent back in.
After some bumps in June’s Primary, Nicolay says her team is working hard to make sure every detail is ironed out come November. They’ve hired a new trainer to make sure all poll workers know their responsibilities.
“I think with COVID, some people are still not comfortable going to the polls and we just want to make sure every vote is counted everyone who chooses to vote has the ability to vote,” said Nicolay.
Governor Cuomo recently passed an executive order with requirements for local election boards to follow. Some of these include sending letters to voters explaining the different ways to vote and finding a way to count ballots faster.
“We have a scanning system right now for counting absentee ballots it is not equipped to count 100,000 ballots it’s equipped to count 20,000 ballots, so we’ll either find a new system or increase that system to take a higher volume.”
She said the first step is making sure to register to vote. Then, voting can be done in person on Election Day, during the nine days of early voting, or by mailing in an absentee ballot. Absentee ballot applications are on the Board of Elections website. After sending in a ballot, it’ll be verified and a ballot will be mailed out. This year, there’s also the option to drop off absentee ballots in person during early voting or on election day.
“When we have ballot certification, which is early September, we’ll start mailing out ballots so that gives people enough time, hopefully, to vote.”
Nicolay said they hope to have the usual 300 polling sites for Election Day and are still working on securing around 30 of them. There will be 12 early voting locations this year scattered across the city and suburbs, and they will be open throughout the morning and evening hours and on weekends.
“It will still be busy because it’s a presidential year and people are clearly paying attention which is great, so we want to give people as many options as they can.”
Nicolay said they’re still looking for election inspectors and other workers to help out during this busy time and asks anyone who’s interested to call the Board of Elections office at (585) 753-1550. You must be registered in the Republican or Democratic Party to work at the board.
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