Early Voting Experiences
Decatur Metro | October 28, 2008David pointed out this blurb in the AJC this morning about early voting downtown…
About 200 people were in line when voting started at the precinct on West Ponce de Leon Avenue in Decatur. But the building was open, so the early arrivers stood inside in a line that snaked down a hallway just off the lobby.
Peter McDade waited 45 minutes, arriving at 6:45 a.m. and walking out at 7:30 a.m.
“I thought it would be about an hour-and-a-half,” he said.
Altmod writes in to DM with her own account…
Early voting went VERY smoothly. The line starts outside and snakes around inside. It looks long and there were a ton of people voting but we only waited outside for 10 minutes and then inside for 20 minutes. They were running a smooth operation (we filled out forms on clipboards and had our id’s verified while we were in line). It went WAY smoother than usual–I usually vote at the Baptist church. Very professional. Indie Coffee House even put out a sign that reminds chilly line waiters that they sell hot drinks! Vote early!
Latest from Decaturish
My wife voted in downtown Decatur Monday afternoon and it took a couple hours. Strangely, it wasn’t the number of voting kiosks (she said there were plenty and most were empty most of the time). The bottleneck was the online system used to verify voters. She was told that volume statewide was making the system run slow as molasses and there wasn’t much they could do.
Lots of folks hanging in, though.
Hmmm….a government run online system that doesn’t have enough bandwidth to handle a few extra people. Shocking!
However, I am sure that when the government takes over health care, it will will run much smoother.
Yes, there was a system glitch on Monday but today things went well. I was at the Ponce location.
We can all sing along: “Spread the health, spread the wealth…kumbayah, my Lord…” oops, can’t say Lord anymore except at church…
Voted Monday @ W Ponce. Got in line @ 5pm, voted about 5 minutes before 7pm. There was another 2 hours of people behind me. Poll workers said everyone who was in line by 7pm would be allowed to vote.
I just returned from voting at the West Ponce facility. I arrived soon after 11:30am and the wait was almost exactly one hour.
I know someone who arrived at the Ponce location a little before 11 Tuesday morning and was finished in an hour.
I arrived at 10am on Monday and was out by 11:15. The process was smooth and the poll workers were terrific. My only complaint was the cold weather. Brrrrrr.
It seems to me that Decatur has a lot of polling places. Do you think this means that even on Nov. 4, the lines really won’t be that long? I have never experienced long lines at Lutheran Church of the Messiah even during the last presidential election. I am still planning to go Nov. 4 so that I can take my kids with me (great example for them) but I hope I’m not setting myself up for a ridiculously long line!
As I recall, there are 5 polling places in Decatur, maybe 4 or 6.
I voted this morning (Tues) and waited just a little over an hour at the polling place on W. Ponce. I got there around 7:40ish, but it was worth getting up a little early.
Actually Left Wing, voter verification in Georgia has been privatized, and it isn’t the first time there’s been problems . So, I guess that totally undermines your point then.
Chris,
I cant find that information anywhere. Where did you find it?
Here’s one link
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/02/voter-calls-con.html
I voted at the West Ponce building Monday. Arrived at 5:30 and did not cast muy ballot until 7:30. Kudos to Dekalb staff on hand who were extremely friendly and helpfull and got us out of the cold (frigid) outside air. No kudos to Secretary of State Karen Handel who today in a news report blamed “mass media created voter hysteria” and local county officials for the long delays. I don’t know if political comments are a no-no on this site, but I can’t wait to votre her out of office in 2010!
My wife arrived about 6:00 PM Tuesday and it took a little over an hour. I was told by someone else that the process took about 45 minutes at 3:00.
arrived at the ponce location at 9AM wednesday, took about an hour. a work buddy voted in dunwoody and it took 3 hours plus. do you think this means that fewer people are voting in Decatur?
I just got back from the Downtown location, and I only had to wait about 45 minutes. According to one of the poll workers, about 2000 voters/day have been showing up on Monday and Tuesday.
Friend reports 3 hour wait downtown on Pryor Street. She’s gonna take her chances Tuesday.
Of course, Pryor St would be Fulton County.
Yes sorry, I meant downtown Atlanta.
I voted at the Ponce location this morning and the total of votes cast through Tuesday were posted. IIRC it was about 1,700 on Monday and about 2,200 on Tuesday at Ponce, about 28,000 county-wide for the two days, plus about 75,000 in the absentee and advance voting from September on, for a total of about 103,000. I’d be interested to know how many registered voters there are in DeKalb by way of comparison.
The AJC had it at 430,458 as of Sept. 2. So using that number already 24% of the county’s population has voted…and we still have a few more days of early voting.
Thanks for the data Melissa!
Well I can’t seem to find a list of polling places in Decatur, but off the top of my head I can already think of more than 6:
Lutheran Church of the Messiah
Holy Trinity Episcopal
Winnona Park ES
Oakhurst Baptist
Decatur Baptist
Renfroe MS
Decatur First Christian
This morning I was thrilled to see ajc.com report that voting at the downtown Decatur location was taking only 30 minutes. So I rushed out, arrived at 10:30am, and waited an hour and a half — not terrible given the lengthy waits at some other locations, but certainly longer than I was hoping for. If the line is still snaking around to the very front of the building, you’re in for at least an hour and a half wait.