11/09/12: Those long, unnecessary lines

This op-ed appeared in The Virginian-Pilot on the date shown.

“I want to thank every American who participated in this election, whether you voted for the very first time or waited in line for a very long time. By the way, we have to fix that.” — President Barack Obama

IN THE DAYS leading up to Tuesday’s elections, all the signs pointed to heavy turnout. Efforts to get their voters to the polls came from all directions. The candidates, the parties and every interest group imaginable urged the public to participate in the “most important election of our lifetime.”

So why weren’t election officials ready?

I think the main reason was that Virginia election officials bought into the notion that turnout for this election would not be as high as it was in 2008. They had at least one data point to look at for that conclusion: the lower number of absentee ballots cast. Eight days before the election, the State Board of Elections released information showing that the number of absentee ballots cast to that point were 30 percent lower than at the same point in 2008.

Of course they were lower.

In 2008, Virginia was preparing for another “most important election in our lifetime.” Despite the fact that you are required to have an excuse to vote absentee, the state’s election officials vigorously encouraged voters to do so. They wanted to avoid long lines on Election Day and emphasized the most common reasons to vote absentee. It was almost as if Virginia had early voting in 2008. I stood in a very long line in Norfolk to cast my in-person absentee ballot.

This year, no such encouragement came from election officials. When I arrived at City Hall to vote last week, I was one of only a handful of voters there. It took me longer to fill out the absentee application than to wait to cast my ballot.

In 2008, 3,723,260 votes were cast in the presidential election. In 2012, with 99.42 percent of the votes tallied, 3,732,259 votes have been cast, an increase of 8,999 votes. And because of the fewer absentee ballots, more people had to wait in line — some for several hours — to vote.

In 2008, Virginia’s top election officials were appointed by a Democratic governor. In 2012, they were appointed by a Republican governor.

Many of the longest lines were in precincts largely composed of minority voters. Images of voters waiting in the cold — some elderly, some disabled — to cast their ballots quickly passed around the Internet. It seemed there was no effort to use curbside voting for those eligible. There have been numerous accounts of people leaving and not casting their ballots, due to the length of the lines.

The reasons offered for the long lines are many, but all point to a miscalculation on the part of election officials about turnout.

The state code provides guidance to local officials about the number of voting machines that are to be available in each precinct, based on the number of registered voters.

But the code appears to be silent on the number of pollbooks that have to be available, one source of the delays. The election officials are to be trained, but that seems to vary from precinct to precinct. The length of the ballot, due to the constitutional amendments and local elections in some localities, increased the time necessary to vote.

Virginia, we have to fix that.

It is beyond time for Virginia to open up absentee ballots to anyone who wants one. Only a few states still cling to the notion that you must have an excuse to vote early. Virginia, mother of presidents, should be a model to the nation on how to efficiently and effectively allow its citizens to cast ballots.

But the problems, as the president pointed out, weren’t limited to Virginia. In a recent article, David Frum, former special assistant to President George W. Bush, made the case for removing politics from elections. He writes, “In fact, in almost no other country do politicians have any say in the administration of elections at all.”

Imagine a United States where the proper forms of identification are the same from one state to the next.

Imagine a United States where polls open and close at the same time, where early voting exists, where the voting machines are the same, where felons’ restoration of voting rights is the same.

And in Virginia, it wouldn’t matter whether our governor was a Democrat or a Republican. The United States likes to consider itself a model of democracy for the rest of the world. If we want to claim that mantle, our voting system should be a model as well.