(C) Arizona Mirror This story was originally published by Arizona Mirror and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . To prepare for a two-page ballot, Maricopa County conducted a mock election • Arizona Mirror [1] ['Jerod Macdonald-Evoy', 'Gloria Rebecca Gomez', 'Grace Panetta The', 'Ashley Murray', 'More From Author', '- May', '.Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus-Coauthors.Is-Layout-Flow', 'Class', 'Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus', 'Display Inline'] Date: 2024-05 Maricopa County held a mock election Wednesday to prepare poll workers and election officials for the upcoming November election to learn what challenges they’ll face with processing and counting ballots that will be two pages long. At the Maricopa County Tabulation and Elections Center, commonly referred to as MCTEC, poll workers gathered alongside staff from the Elections Department to simulate the election. Lawmakers have already sent six measures to the ballot, and are poised to send more, largely to avoid vetoes from Gov. Katie Hobbs. In addition, there are several citizen initiatives expected to qualify for the ballot. All of that means the ballots will be too long to fit on a single piece of paper in Maricopa County. SUPPORT NEWS YOU TRUST. DONATE At Wednesday’s mock election, poll workers took on the role of voters and were handed a fake voter identification card that they’d then scan at the polling station in order to obtain their ballot, just like on Election Day. However, some of the cards had instructions on them detailing different “disturbances” or issues that the voter they were roleplaying as might have. The mock polling place included 12 check-in kiosks and three ballot-on-demand printers that the county wanted to put through their paces. During the 2022 midterm elections, the election in Maricopa County was marred by printer issues that meant ballot tabulators at polling locations couldn’t read some ballots. (Affected ballots were all sent to MCTEC and counted later.) The printers the county used at that time are no longer in use and Scott Jarrett, the county’s elections director, said their plan was to put 800 voters through them during a two hour period during the mock election, twice the number the county’s busiest polling site reported last election. Elections officials checked 2020 and 2022 and found that the highest volume voting centers saw around 400 votes in a two-hour time period. The mock election is a stress test that allows the county to see where things went right and importantly, where things went wrong, Jarrett said. On top of what will likely be a contentious election cycle, this will be the first time since 2006 that voters will have seen a two-page ballot. The ballot will be double-sided, with voters needing to vote both the front and back of each ballot in order to complete their vote. Jarrett said he was “fairly confident” that the ballot will not reach three pages, which would be even more costly to Arizona counties. The first page of the ballot will be tailored to the voter and the races that are relevant to where they live, while the second page will be races that are the same across the county. That includes judges and ballot measures. This is also the county’s first full mock election including poll workers and staff. Some 60 poll workers and 50 employees of the elections department participated Wednesday. One challenge the county will face on Election Day is just how long it will take voters to cast their ballots: Typically, it takes voters about 10 minutes to fill out their ballot, but officials found it takes between 13 and 15 minutes on average for voters to complete the two-page ballot. That additional time could lead to longer lines at polling sites, something that the county has faced criticism for before. Maricopa County Election Officials said they felt confident that they will be able to administer the election “no matter the number of pages” and anticipate pushing to educate voters ahead of time in order to avoid any issues. Early ballots for the general election will start being distributed by Oct. 9. For more information about the primary and general elections in Maricopa County voters can visit BeBallotReady.Vote. [END] --- [1] Url: https://azmirror.com/briefs/to-prepare-for-a-two-page-ballot-maricopa-county-conducted-a-mock-election/ Published and (C) by Arizona Mirror Content appears here under this condition or license: Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/azmirror/