Show Up or Shut Up Part 3

I see plenty of articles across multiple platforms offering ideas to make a few hundred dollars here, a side hustle there, or a new way to turn spare time into meaningful extra income.

This fall, there is a great opportunity hiding in plain sight for writers at all stages of their career: your local election office needs poll workers. In many communities, the work pays several hundred dollars for a day’s work, connects you with your neighbors, and gives you a front-row seat to the machinery of democracy.

That last part matters. Unproven and likely unprovable allegations of election fraud grab headlines and help the accusers raise billions of dollars. Elections have become dramatic, noisy, and increasingly easy to treat as a spectacle. There are predictions markets, including gambling platforms, and there are endless arguments, rumors, and commentary about what might happen before, during, and after the vote.

None of us should be buying tickets to this circus. If democracy is going to work, we all need to stop watching from the sidelines and step up. People who work as poll officials can testify personally that if there's any fraud going on its in the finger pointing fund raisers.

There is Real Work to be Done

As I said in the first installment of this series, we should never automatically dismiss anyone's allegations. But felonies require evidence beyond a reasonable doubt and for that to exist on any large scale would involve tens of thousands of people from every political persuasion, all parties, all walks of life, and every economic standing.

If you think that's possible, read on. Elections are complicated. They look simple when all we do is walk in, check in, receive a ballot, vote, and leave — but behind that process is a temporary operation with dozens of moving parts. There is tons of real work to be done on a short schedule.

Most of the 18,000 local election offices in America have only a small full-time staff. During election season, they depend on temporary workers from the community to help set up voting locations, troubleshoot problems, support early voting, and make Election Day possible.

In my home county, that means making ready for a quarter of a million people to vote at twenty early voting sites and more than seventy Election Day sites. Each location needs tables, chairs, computers, printers, office supplies, voting booths, tabulators, and signs guiding voters from the parking lot to the ballot station.

The timeline is unforgiving. Election offices may have only a few days to transform schools, gyms, community centers, and conference rooms into functioning polling places — and only a few days afterward to pack everything up and return those spaces to normal.

I have done that work. It sometimes made me compare it what I imagine a wedding planner does. They’re responsible for announcements and invitations, rehearsal ceremonies, catering, decorations, venues, transportation, hotels, and travel arrangements — except in the elections business in my county it’s like staging ninety weddings simultaneously.

Poll workers are usually recruited, trained, and assigned by election office staff. Their placement is not random. Many jurisdictions must balance party affiliation, staffing levels, training requirements, experience, and geography while trying to assign people as close to home as possible.

Even in a medium-sized city, that process can mean filling hundreds of temporary positions with qualified, trained people who are capable of working long days of detailed work.

Poll Workers Are Paid

Poll workers are not volunteers. Most people think we do the work out of the goodness of our heart, which might be a nice sentiment but not a practical one. Paid workers have a stake in their work by not only showing up but performing the work that the job demands. Volunteers are more likely to be absent without notice, unfocused and distracted to the point of workplace disruption and just plain lousy employees. Paid workers come to work, volunteers come to have fun.

Compensation varies widely by jurisdiction, but this is not pretend work. In my home county, poll workers are paid a flat fee of roughly $300 to $400 on Election Day and an hourly rate with overtime protection during early voting. Someone who works the full election season can earn a meaningful amount of extra income.

The longer-term temporary jobs behind the scenes can also pay competitive hourly wages. The exact amount depends on the location, the role, and the year, but the work is valuable — and election offices appreciate it.

You Meet Your Community in a Way Nothing Else Allows

Across almost twenty elections over eleven years, my love of this country has grown exponentially. The most rewarding part has always been the brief but meaningful chance to interact with citizens in my community as no other experience offers. Here's a secret: as a writer, these interactions are pure gold.

There is the 100-year-old voter who walks through the door and instantly changes the room. I wonder about the life they have lived, the elections they have seen, and the effort it took to arrive at the polling place that day. If I have time to ask them their secret to longevity, their answers have always been good enough to fill whole character sketches.

There is the elderly married couple who help each other to the ballot table with quiet care. Every small gesture — steadying an arm, pointing to a line, waiting patiently by the tabulator — says something about love that no campaign ad ever could. Our staff is trained to offer assistance whenever possible, but often these two simply want to share the experience together.

There are families who vote together every election as a tradition. Parents bring children, children become adults, and the ritual continues. Over the years I’ve seen little kids grow into young voters who come back every election and I’ve seen those kids return with spouses and children of their own. In a country where families are often scattered and busy, voting becomes one of the few civic events people still make time to share. It’s a joy to witness.

There are adult children who bring elderly parents to vote, and the relationship has clearly shifted. The child is now the caregiver. The patience, tenderness, and attention in those moments remind me of helping my own parents vote in their final election years ago. If ever I have any doubt about the integrity of our elections, I recall the power of these images.

There are parents coming to vote with an 18-year-old first-time voter, proud enough to embarrass their child and happy enough to ask whether we can announce the milestone to the room. “Ladies and gentlemen, please help us welcome a first-time voter!” We ask their permission, of course. They usually look startled, then trapped, then touched. There is no graceful escape from a parent’s pride.

And there are newly naturalized citizens voting for the first time. More than once, those moments have brought tears to my eyes. I think about the years of risk, the distance from their childhood home they have traveled, and the sheer force of will, belief and faith that led them to that opportunity that day. I think about the people and places they left behind. Then I watch them participate in an election as an American citizen, and I am reminded that this ordinary process is for them anything but ordinary.

As a writer, I am always looking for ways to sharpen my powers of observation. Watching people in a crowd can teach us something. Serving them at a polling place teaches even more. The energy is high, the stakes feel real, and people arrive alert to the fact that they are taking part in something larger than themselves.

Do Not Wait Until Election Day

By the time most voters start thinking seriously about an election, local election offices have already been working for months. To make it appear seamless, training, staffing, site preparation, absentee voting, overseas ballots, early voting, equipment testing, and logistics all begin long before Election Day.

That is why the best time to apply is before the crunch arrives. If you are curious, check your local election office now. Requirements, hours, duties, training, and pay vary by state and county, so the details that matter most are local.

The U.S. Election Assistance Commission maintains a poll worker lookup tool that can point you to information for your community. National Poll Worker Recruitment Day is August 11 this year and also a good reminder to sign up, ask questions, and see where help is needed.

Be a Part of American Democracy

No one sells tickets to election day because we’re all expected to be there. Democracy doesn’t happen somewhere else. It happens in school gyms, community centers, church halls, conference rooms, and county warehouses. It happens because ordinary people show up, learn the process, do the work, and help their neighbors vote.

Let’s go, friend.

This is the third in my series on election integrity in the United States. Over the last eleven years I've served as a poll worker during 18 elections in my community, including both early voting and election day each time. The opinions I offer are my own.