County elections board 'desperately looking for election judges' ahead of primary election

Michael D. Garcia, The Herald-Mail
·2 min read
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With early voting nearly two weeks away, the Washington County Board of Elections still face an election judge shortage.

According to a previous report, the county board of elections was 188 election judges short in order to run, comfortably, about 49 election sites. Barry Jackson, deputy director of the county elections board, told The Herald-Mail in a telephone interview the board remains 100 election judges short of the number sought.

"We're moving in the right direction, but ... we still do need people," Jackson said.

Jackson added the board was looking for community members to volunteer to be an election judge before the last day of training classes for election judges – July 1.

The county elections board recently promoted on social media that it is "desperately looking for election judges to fill these training classes," which had gained over 100 post shares from county officials and candidates for the upcoming 2022 primary election.

"Consider a little civic duty and sign-up to be an election judge," one Facebook post read.

Election sites could see some alleviation of large crowds due to mail-in ballots, according to Jackson. The county elections board has already received 8,000 applications for mail-in ballots.

"That means, maybe, that's 8,000 people who won't be coming to the polling places and voting in-person," Jackson said. "So that should alleviate some of the pressure on our election judges on Election Day. We really won't know till after Election Day how it all shakes out."

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As of May 31, 2022, the county currently has 98,874 active voters, according to the county elections board website.

Jackson said the county elections board would not turn people away if they wanted to become election judges after July 1, but it would be a lot more difficult to get them properly trained in time for Election Day.

"That's why we're trying to get them in this coming week so that we won't have to worry about it," he said.

The schedule for the remaining training classes for election judges are:

  • June 30, from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.

  • June 30, from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.

  • July 1, from 9 p.m. to noon

  • July 1, from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.

The training classes will be held in-person at the county elections board headquarters on 17718 Virginia Ave. Volunteers who sign up could earn $200 to $250.

For more information, visit www.washco-mdelections.org/become-an-election-judge or call 240-313-2057. The early voting period is July 7 to July 14. The primary election will be on July 19.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: Washington County Elections Board seeks judges before Maryland primary