PASCACK VALLEY AREA, N.J.—In the leadup to the Nov. 2 general election, in a first statewide, Bergen County will place voting machines in seven towns to allow registered voters to cast early in-person ballots.
Under a law Gov. Phil Murphy signed March 30, early in-person voting, covering nine days leading into Election Day, will be offered on a certain number of machines in every county, based on total registered voters. With Murphy’s signature, New Jersey became the 25th state to approve early voting this year.
Patricia DiCostanzo, Bergen County’s outgoing superintendent of elections, told Pascack Press that the county eventually will purchase about 80 new voting machines with voter-verified paper ballots to conduct early voting.
She said hundreds of electronic poll books must be purchased and tested between now and November, and thousands of poll workers trained on them.
She said the state has offered to pay for new electronic poll books for poll workers to check voter registrations in real-time. However, she said, it was unclear who was paying for the new voting machines that produce paper ballots, which New Jersey requires for early voting.
Bergen County has the most registered voters—675,475 as of April 1—of all 21 counties in the Garden State.
This November, voters will select a governor and all 120 state Legislature seats. The Bergen County Clerk is up for re-election. And here in the Pascack Valley, several seats on governing bodies are up for grabs.
DiCostanzo said elections officials have not identified the seven towns to host early-voting machines. She said each voting machine placed for early voting must contain the local ballots for each of Bergen County’s 70 municipalities.
About 10 machines will be placed in each town chosen to host the early voting, she said.
While the governor and bill sponsors have said election officials should be ready given their success with last year’s mostly vote-by-mail elections and calls for early voting by legislators, election officials said the deadline is short, and so are funds to buy new machines, electronic poll books, and provide training and staffing for early voting.
DiCostanzo said that the state was rushing the early-voting process and putting election officials under intense pressure to get a new voting system in place and running error-free in little more than six months.
“Not that we can’t do this but there’s a lot of work to be done to put this voting process together between now and November,” said DiCostanzo. She suggested it would have been better to postpone it until 2022 and give counties time to purchase new machines, buy new e-poll books, and prepare facilities and staff.
“It’s too rushed, there’s too many pieces, and there’s not enough funding, from what we’re told,” DiCostanzo said. “It’s scary the way they’re rushing this process.”
She said that elections officials recently attended an equipment expo where new paper-verified voting machines were demonstrated as well as electronic poll books.
She said counties are waiting for the state to certify what equipment meets their standards and then the counties can place orders. DiCostanzo revealed that she is retiring, effective April 30, as is Deputy Superintendent of Elections Theresa O’Connor. A transition to a new superintendent and deputy is underway, she said.
Upon signing the early-voting law, Murphy addressed the press:
“Today, and I don’t say this lightly, New Jersey reminds the nation that our democracy is made stronger when we make it easier for the people’s voices to be heard, that our democracy wins when we open the doors of our polling places wide, instead of slamming them shut.”
He said, “I cannot overlook that this early voting bill passed our Legislature the same day that the governor of Georgia was signing a law restricting the rights of Georgians to vote, even making it a crime to give a voter waiting in line a bottle of water.”
Murphy, a Democrat, said “It is incredulous that the response to those who claim that last year’s presidential election was rigged, against all evidence to the contrary, are now doing their damnedest to openly and unapologetically rig elections by suppressing voter rights.”
Under the new law, counties will open three to seven polling places depending on numbers of voters. The advance voting will be offered for nine days from Saturday, Oct. 23 through Sunday, Oct. 31, weekends included.
Currently 16 of 21 counties do not use machines with paper ballots that may be audited post-election.
Bergen County has no machines that produce paper ballots to verify or certify their results. Its machines have cartridges that record votes and are sealed to prevent tampering. The machines are not connected to the internet.
Moreover, Bergen would need to purchase electronic poll books, which allow workers to verify voters are registered and prevent any voter fraud. The e-poll books need to be synced with the state’s voter registration system, which county officials have said does not always work well or efficiently.
The law provides $20 million now and $20 million for fiscal year 2022, which begins July 1.
An estimate of early-voting costs from the state association of counties predicted it would cost New Jersey’s 21 counties about $77 million, much more than currently allocated, to buy new voting machines, electronic poll books, and conduct training for early voting.
The association estimates another $9 million for poll workers’ annual stipends during early voting, set-up and equipment training/testing.
Also, the association’s executive director said continuing yearly operational costs for early voting “will be staggering” and borne by taxpayers.
Some county officials told an online news outlet that they may appeal the new law as an unfunded mandate to a state agency if the state refuses to cover early-voting costs.
Also, how long it takes for voting machines and electronic poll books to arrive after ordering will play a role in whether early voting efforts move along on schedule.
DiCostanzo pointed out that last Nov. 3, despite Covid protocols and limited in-person voting, almost 35,000 registered voters went to polling places to drop off a ballot or vote in person.rather than submit a vote-by-mail ballot.
She said while early voting is a good thing, the state was not being fair to elections staff statewide by thrusting such a huge change on them in only half a year’s time.