Core77

The American Voting Experience

Surprisingly primitive, but just twelve minutes in and out

By Rain Noe - November 8, 2016

in UX

This morning at 6am, I cast my vote for President of the United States. Our non-American readers may wonder what the actual UX of our voting process is like. I'll tell you—it's surprisingly primitive.

Enter a caption (optional)

Here in my district in downtown Manhattan, the nearest polling place is at an elementary school down the block. The kids have school off today. At 6am, there was little indication that a key function of our democratic process is being enacted within; just a few photocopied signs taped to the closed door that say "VOTE HERE" in English, Spanish and Chinese (representative of this neighborhood's dominant ethnicities).

Inside, I queued up in a hallway behind six people. A clearly posted sign and icon said "NO PHOTOS," but that didn't stop the Millennial girl in front of me from whipping out her smartphone and taking a photo of the crowded room beyond. I'll describe that room in a moment.

The bottleneck at the end of the hallway is for sorting voters according to their district. Weeks or months before the election, the U.S. government mails voter cards to each registered voter. These cards have your district printed on them.

Enter a caption (optional)

The voter sorting process is a little more prosaic than it is at Hogwarts. No singing hat, just a towering, stern-faced woman asking if you know your district. Half of those in the queue had their voter cards, and were swiftly sent to one of the many folding plastic desks around the room that had white signs posted on them with district numbers. If you forgot your card at home, as I did, you had to wait in a second queue at a desk near the front of the room.

While waiting in this queue, you have a chance to observe the room, which—at least in New York City—is filled with a wonderful example of American diversity. Just about every race you can think of is represented. The voters were both young and old, while the volunteer staff was predominantly elderly. In terms of gender, males and females were present in roughly equal numbers, and the aforementioned stern-faced woman handling the sorting was, I am 90% sure, transgender.

At this second sorting line, three volunteers look up your address in a series of binders. Surprisingly, I did not have to show my ID, only state my address. They match your address to a district number, then send you to the appropriate district desk. There is an opportunity for confusion here because these desks have two numbers, one for "Election District" and one for "Assembly District." I overheard a couple of people being told they had mixed the numbers up and were at the wrong desk.

Enter a caption (optional)

At this district desk, a second group of volunteers look up your name in a binder. I felt bad for the elderly woman doing the looking up at this desk, as she appeared on the verge of senility; though the binder's pages clearly featured alphabetical tabs along the margins, she had a lot of trouble finding people's names. The woman in front of me had a last name that began with a "T," yet the looker-upper began scanning the "V" page, could not find the name, and announced that Mrs. T must be at the wrong desk. She instructed her to go to the front of the room and start over.

Mrs. T patiently flipped through the binder to locate her own name and was finally given a ballot.

Then it was my turn. My last name begins with "N," and the woman tried to look me up on the "P" page. I politely pointed out the error, and she looked confused and flipped to "L." Eventually she worked her way through the book and found my name.

Next to each name is a blank signature box, which they ask you to sign. After you sign it, they hand you the ballot, a large white sheet of paper—it feels like it's two feet long—and a manila folder to enclose it within (presumably for privacy). Then you're sent to the back of the room, where the voting "booths" are.

I put "booths" in quotes because at this location, the "booth" is just a lectern with a white cardboard privacy shield around it on three sides. They looked like this:

Image source: NBC New York

There were about twenty of these in the back of the room, mostly occupied. In the available "booth" that I took, the long red cord that is supposed to be attached to a pen was missing the pen, the ring having being pried open. Unbelievably, I suppose someone had stolen the pen.

I borrowed a pen from one of the district desks and went back to the "booth." On the inside of the privacy shield are instructions on how to fill the ballots out: Color in the oval next to your candidates' names, don't enter multiple votes, how to do a write-in vote, et cetera.

Image source: Patch.com

I was surprised at how poor the graphic design of the ballots are, and really regret not sneaking a photo to show you; but as an example, look at this ballot from a past election:

Enter a caption (optional)

As you can see, it would be easy for someone unfamiliar with the process—like the woman doing the looking-up at the district desk, for instance—to become confused. Let's say in the ballot above you are voting for Cuomo. You might mistakenly think you are meant to color in each oval next to Cuomo's name in each row, which would count as multiple votes and your ballot would then be discounted (likely without your knowledge). On the ballot I had this morning, both Presidential candidates were listed multiple times under multiple parties. In my sleepy state, I had to stop myself from coloring in more than one oval per section because the layout was confusing.

With the ballot filled out, you carry it across the room to the scanning machines. This is an LCD screen with a slot on the bottom. It looked like this:

Image source: silive

There are no instructions as to how to orient your ballot when inserting it. A woman standing next to the machine saw my confusion and said it didn't matter how you put it in.

I slid the ballot into the slot, which sucked it in, and expected to see some feedback on the screen repeating my choices. Instead it just said "YOUR VOTE HAS BEEN COUNTED. THANK YOU" and that was it. The woman next to the machine took my manila folder, I suppose they recirculate them.

All told, it took about twelve minutes start to finish. There's no coffee or donuts, like I've seen on some places in the news, this is New York so people are just in and out with no socializing or fuss.

I was surprised that no one ever asked to see my ID; if you are a registered voter and are in the correct book, that's all you need to be given a ballot. I'm not smart enough to know how this system could or couldn't be gamed, but I expected something a little more airport-security-like.

If you are an American voter in a different part of the country, I'm very curious to hear what the voting process is like in your neck of the woods. If you live in a different country, I'm twice as curious to know what voting is like over there. Please let us know in the comments below.

o

Favorite This
Q
6

Comment

Comments

luisa milani

8 years ago

Z

Z

Reply

I'm from Brazil, and here is actually quite organized. It's mandatory to vote here, if you don't you can "justify" (as we say), which means going to the registration center after the election and saying you didn't vote. If you don't vote nor justify you can pay a small fine and are not elegible for public jobs or to issue a passport until you do one of those two things.
As it's mandatory, it's always on a sunday, and the poles are open from 8am to 7pm, normally in schools, but not only. We have a electronic ballot (I uploaded a pic) where we put the number of the candidate we want to vote, and we only vote for the politians, we don't vote for laws or any of these. And is the one with the majority of the total votes that win, we don't have the delegates system as you have in the USA. Normally the results are in before 10pm of the same day.
We all have a voting document ("electoral title"), which has our electorate number, the number of our zone (which indicates the school) and the number of our session, which indicates the room we have to go. Normally it's the same place every election, and if you change your address you can go to the registration center and change the place you vote.
In the room there is only one booth that look similar to yours in the USA, we also have to sign a book, and present our ID. While someone is voting it's not allowed for other people to be too close to the booth and peek on the vote. Normally it doesn't take very long to vote.

!Report as spam
Juan Cano

8 years ago

Z

Z

Reply

I live in Warwick, Rhode Island, small town. The elections were just up the street at the Grade School. You needed a photo ID to vote. There was only one line. You came to a desk with 3 people checking voters in. When one spot opened up you walked up to them. You handed your license. They asked you the name and address on the license. Then they had a scanner hooked up to an iPad where they scanned the bar code on my license and the iPad showed I was eligible to vote. Then I signed my name on the iPad. I was then handed the ballet in the folder like you mentioned, and inserted in the same machine you showed. 15 minutes tops.

!Report as spam
Rodrigo Lauret

8 years ago

Z

Z

Reply

Well, here in Argentina we vote for president every four years, and almost always on a Sunday. We go to elementary schools, who has different desk depending on your lastname's initial letter. Previous days to election, you can sort out in internet which school corresponds with your lastname. Once you reach your desk, there's 4 people who check your ID at the same time in 4 different list because here, voting is a civic obligation and they need to count out who has voted and who has not. When they aks for your ID card, they keep it until you've voted. They give you an white envelope signed by the four members of the desk and you got to get inside a classroom called "dark room", properly prepared for that day and with a table with all the ballots divided by parties. The ballot has dotted lines so you can make multiple votes, you can choose president and vice of A party, then senators of B party, deputies of C party and so on. But you have to cut the ballot yourself with your hands because there's no ruler or scissors on the "dark room". Once you get your whole ballot or multiple pieces of diverse ballots into the envelope, you get out the classroom and in view of all the 4 members you put the envelope inside a cardboard ballot box or urn. Then they return your ID card with a small voucher or proof of vote and you go home. Hope i was clear with my general explanation of how whe vote here! I attached image is the ballot of our actual president where you can see the dotted lines i mentioned.

!Report as spam
- Rodrigo Lauret
  
  Rodrigo Lauret
  
  8 years ago
  
  Z
  
  Z
  
  Reply
  
  Missed that one last sentence, here's the image.
  
  !Report as spam
darlawilson

8 years ago

Z

Z

Reply

and don t help at all :(

!Report as spam
Kivi Shapiro

8 years ago

Z

Z

Reply

Canadian elections are very similar up to the point of marking your ballot. The design of the ballot tends to be better--each candidate is only shown once, and there are arrows pointing to each selection, each with a break in it. You indicate your choice by filling in the gap in the appropriate arrow. Then you fold the ballot, bring it to a box with a slit in the top, and--under the watchful eye of an election official--pop it in. You have to do it yourself, the official can't do it for you. Then that's it, it's off to Timmy's to get a double-double.

!Report as spam