Sedgwick County election worker shortage ‘concerning’

There are 40 days left until Election Day.

And Sedgwick County still needs about 250 people to help staff the polls.

Election Commissioner Tabitha Lehman says she wants to have close to 1,000 poll workers on Nov. 8 because she expects high turnout.

“We are madly trying to find more people,” Lehman told county commissioners on Wednesday. “We will take just about anybody.”

Lehman said after the meeting that the office had about 650 poll workers for the 2012 election and 591 workers for the 2014 election.

“Our registration numbers have begun increasing,” she said. “We are facing having more cancellations come in right now than we’re getting applications.”

Lehman said she has several polling locations with more than five openings.

“That is very concerning to me,” Lehman said. “We have exhausted our normal list of elections workers.”

Lehman said her office was considering using mailers asking for more workers.

“But of course, that is an expense that we would rather not spend if we can get them otherwise,” Lehman said.

The elections office sent an e-mail to workers asking for recommendations of friends and family to work the polls, too. It was counterproductive: The office received 12 cancellations responding to the e-mail.

“That was not very helpful,” Lehman said, chuckling.

If it falls short on recruiting workers, the office can shift workers around between polling locations on Election Day.

“(But) right now, we’re focused on making sure we don’t get to that point,” Lehman said.

To be an election worker, you can be a Republican, Democrat, Libertarian or unaffiliated voter registered in Sedgwick County.

Students ages 16 and 17 can be poll workers if they meet all other requirements to vote.

The pay is $7.50 per hour. With a presidential Election Day lasting about 16 hours for a worker, that’s $120.

“It’s not a lot, but we would like to appeal to people’s civic pride and civic duty,” Lehman said.

Lehman said the office tries to assign poll workers to their own precinct first unless it’s already full. She thinks the shortage of election workers is not unique to Sedgwick County.

“It’s the tone of this election, probably,” she said.

Poll workers help greet voters, check them in, distribute ballots or get voters set up at voting machines.

You can sign up to be an election worker at www.sedgwickcounty.org/elections or by calling 316-660-7119. Poll workers are supposed to attend a three-hour training class before Election Day as well.

This story was originally published September 28, 2016 at 4:16 PM with the headline "Sedgwick County election worker shortage ‘concerning’."