COVID-19: Safety procedures at the portage county election polls
Gershon Harrell
Nov. 3 marks the official voting day for the presidential election, and for citizens of Ohio who have chosen to vote in person, there will be safety precautions in place to combat the spread of COVID-19.
Secretary of State, Frank Larose mandated the Ohio Voting Safety Plan to the states 88 county board of elections in the form of the 48-point plan which has safety requirements for the board of elections, recommendations for voters and guidelines to run a healthy election.
The 48-point plan outlines that there should be routine cleaning of polling machines and curbside voting should be available to voters.
Director of Portage County Board of Elections, Faith Lyon said voting at the polls won’t look too different except that everyone will be required to wear masks or a face shield, and stand six feet a part, enforcing the social distance protocol.
Lyon said social distancing will give the illusion that the line may be longer than what it is, but that is only because they are following Ohio guidelines of keeping everyone at a safe distance.
“We’re also going to be providing for our voters, a glove if they choose to wear it, so that when they’re touching their pin to vote their ballot or touching the stylist or writing their signature on the poll pad, they could have that extra protection of the glove to do that as well,” Lyon said.
Currently in the state of Ohio there are 150,761 while in portage county there are 1,226 confirmed cases. Recently the county had moved to the red level for a high level of COVID-19 cases with most of their cases being linked back to Kent State University.
Lyon said, despite Portage county falling into the red she isn’t worried about in person voting at the polls because they have taken the necessary safety precautions.
“We’ll be practicing many of the same things at the polls but also because we are a facility that’s voting for such a long period of time and it is a facility that we own, we were able to put up some plexiglass divider between our staff and the voter as well to help protect one another,” Lyon said.
Poll workers and election officials will be required to take a temperature test, their temperature not exceeding 101.4.
Early voting begins Tuesday Oct. 6, and Lyon said they are expecting 15 to 25,000 people voting in person.