Hearing reports of folks having long lines at the polls in Medford. This is a really good sign – looks like high turnout all around.
No voting irregularities except the usual run of the mill stuff, like the occasional Warden not letting pollchecker sit close enough to sign-in table to hear. Otherwise, smooth operation.
tbladesays
I voted about 10 minutes ago, about 7:20am.
When I got to check in, there was an “AV” next to my name. The election worker told me that I couldn’t vote because I had requested an absentee ballot, which I had not done. I continued to insist that I did not request an absentee ballot. An election clerk came over and send that I could vote here, but it must be noted onthe rolls that I voted in person. It was unsettling to say the least. Also, this is the second problem I had at this polling place; during the primary I was told I was on the inactive voter list and was asked for photo ID with the reason given that I did not return the city cencus – which I absolutely did, twice!
To top off the voting experience, between the AV surprise and my rush to get to work, I totally forgot to vote on all the ballot measures!
bluefreaksays
I had the same issue in Mansfield (precinct 5).
Out of curiosity, did you vote absentee in the primary? I was chatting with one of the other members of our town committee and she had the exact same issue as I did (voted absentee in the primary, did not file for (or receive) an absentee ballot in the general election, flagged AV in the voter roll). The warden allowed both of us to vote on a regular ballot, but this does appear to be a screw-up on the part of the SoS’ office.
tbladesays
And, as I mentioned, I had difficulty then, too.
I have not voted absentee since I moved to Waltham.
I should mention also that turnout looked solid in South Waltham with a short wait in line; I arrived at 7:11 and was out 15 mins later.
Davidsays
I voted at about 8 am, after having waited in line for about 20 minutes. I was #163. Seems like high turnout – we rarely have lines that long.
afertigsays
Are others experiencing long lines? Anybody turned away from voting?
Davidsays
Nobody turned away – everything seemed to be going very smoothly. A cop barked unnecessarily loudly at an Obama sign-holder who had ventured too close to the polling place, but otherwise it was uneventful.
scosays
Checking in from our GOTV office in Watertown — polls are packed! Lines are long everywhere, which I take as a good sign.
ChrisinNorthAndoversays
who lives in the same precinct as me in Andover was #229 at 8:10 this morning. She said the polling location was pretty busy, but no issues voting.
Steve Steinsays
was as busy as I’ve ever seen it this morning. Took about 20 minutes to vote.
centralmassdadsays
Got there at 7:15. Hour-long wait. Was number 275.
That is probably bad for Warren in my neighborhood, but good for her if it is a general trend.
No line at all at 7:45! I think there was more of a line at Holy Name, across the street, which is a West Roxbury precinct.
HR's Kevinsays
No line at 4:30 when I voted, but there was a lot of activity and sheet for my street looked like most people were already checked off, so I think there must have been good turnout this morning.
Decent line at the Columbus Elementary School. Waited ten or twelve minutes; I was voter #254 at 8:34 AM. Everyone seemed in good spirits, and the school bake sale was doing reasonable business.
Cheers, Blue Mass Group, it’s been a while.
dca-bossays
Was in line this morning around 6:50 and there were already about 40-50 people waiting for the doors to open. Voted around 7:10 and was #42. My wife went a bit later and voted around 8:00 and was about #250, so heavy turnout but they were moving people through pretty quickly.
bluewatchsays
Over an hour wait. People are leaving in frustration.
Does anyone know how easy it will be for a non-campaign worker to get into the Warren party at the Fairmont Copley tonight? I have scoured the internets for info, to no avail…
Thanks!
~Bets
NewtonJacksays
I was in line at 7:10, out just before 7:30. #82 in my precinct. Mood was generally friendly (if a bit sleepy) and it didn’t seem that anyone was having any issues with access. The election warden as well as the poll watchers are well known in our precinct and are generally respected and well liked by our community. I don’t expect there will be any problems there today.
Alsays
Much heavier turnout than normal by 9:30 AM based on machine count when submitting ballot.
liveandletlivesays
Standing out for the after work crowd and voting this afternoon. Go Elizabeth!!!
The 'Cusesays
No Elizabeth Warren signholders outside the Southeast School, but a handful of Romney/Brown ones. There was a truck with a large Warren sign parked on the street.
For the primary, when I voted I was #6 or #8 in my precinct (2B) to vote an hour after the polls opened. This time, an hour into polling, I was #132. VERY busy, but almost no wait (less than a minute), they were getting us through pretty quickly. For the first time since I’ve been voting there (11 years now), there were (I assume) poll watchers sitting to the side of the check-in table crossing names off their own clipboard lists as the check-in woman called our names out.
Also, in front of me in line was a middle-aged nurse with a hispanic accent who was voting in her first-ever election. She was nervous and had a poll worker accompany her throughout the process, and when she put her ballot into the scantron machine and the poll worker said “That’s it! You just voted, congratulations!” she was SO amazed an excited. It was one of those scenes that makes you realize how important voting is, and why no one should ever take that right for granted.
purplemousesays
11:45 packed but no wait. #783 pushing 30% turnout thus far. Not sure what heavy turn out means here in a very red part of the commonwealth, other than lots of people are voting.
sabutaisays
M’borough busier than I remember 2008 being. Huge turnout.
Poll clerk telling voters that she hopes “the best man wins tonight”. Was visibly annoyed when I reminded her that a woman was running for president and was on our ballots.
SomervilleTomsays
I talked to a poll worker, he said “enormous turnout, probably record.” He expects a 95% turnout. I was voter number 615, at 12:10p. I waited in line for an hour and fifteen minutes.
There were problems with the scanning machine, corrected after an hour. The clerk said the machines have performed flawlessly in the past, but cannot handle today’s turnout. Mayor Curtatone stopped by, thanked us for waiting, and said lines are longer in other Somerville polling places.
This is all good for Elizabeth Warren. I hope it’s like this nationwide.
bluewatchsays
A problem with the scanning machine is a very serious issue. What was the problem? What happened to resolve it? Was somebody from the Warren campaign notified?
dcsohlsays
The scanning machine at my precinct was jammed for a couple of minutes. They were able to get it working though quickly enough.
bluewatchsays
How did they get it working without missing any votes?
If they turned it off, they might have wiped previous votes.
Was the Warren poll watcher notified?
It’s a serious issue.
dcsohlsays
The various pollwatchers *and* a police officer were all involved in clearing it up. It said that I was voter #226 so I’m pretty confident it didn’t get powered off or lose data.
SomervilleTomsays
They halted voting for about an hour, the police came and workers swapped out the scanning machine and set up the new one while police watched. There were election officials (including the Mayor) all over the place.
I couldn’t actually see what was happening in the polling place during all this, the place was packed and the lines were snaking all through the building.
bluewatchsays
If they swapped out a voting machine, there is a possibility that all of the votes on the old machine were lost. Did anybody notify the Warren observers? What happened to the old machine? Remember, each machine has a separate memory card which records all of the votes as they occur.
mike_cotesays
they can, I believe, just rescan the ballots upto that point. I would hope that the observers would be prepared for that possibility. Maybe my hope is misplaced, but having been an observer in the past, such things are expected and the scanned ballots provide a paper trail.
bluewatchsays
It is probably necessary to re-scan the ballots, but did they actually do the re-scan? Remember, a paper trail is only helpful if there is a recount.
There was a 30 minute wait to vote, with about 75 people in line in front of us. And we got there just before the pre-lunch rush.
Christophersays
…our poll checkers at one location are reporting police being, shall we say, zealous about enforcing rules regarding where they can position themselves. Also Senator Brown spent the morning up here.
cat-servantsays
Just voted at 2PM, was voter #420 or so (Machine was around 842, but each voter was casting 2 ballots). For my apartment-and-student-heavy precinct this was very high. There even was a tiny little line in the middle of the day!
sharoneysays
At 3 pm I was voter #970 out of 2, 325 registered voters in my town. That’s a VERY high turnout sofar–perhaps even a record. There are twice the number of Dems as Repubs here, but their combined total is still below the number of independents, who have traditionally voted Dem.
When I showed up they had five election workers checking off names going in, and three going out. The usual is two each. There was only one person in front of me in my line. In our town everyone knows everyone else, so things went pretty smoothly. I didn’t notice any shenanigans.
But we’ll see…
I voted at approximately 3:30 PM at Ward 4 Precinct 1 in Boston. The ballot is two pages long, and each page has to be separately fed into the scanner. The counter registered 1999 when I submitted my second page. That would be approximately 999 votes cast in my precinct, which is a lot, but I’m not sure about the percentage. No line but it was busy for mid-afternoon. Very different from the turnout in January 2010 for the Brown-Coakley Special Election.
dcsohlsays
As of 3PM, at least 2 precincts in Natick (#1 and #3) already had over 50% turnout!
methuenprogressivesays
Our group were voters #152 through #166 at 7:50 AM. It was very crowded,A Methuen Police Officer we know said that twice young voters were turned away because even though they had registered at the DMV months ago, their names were not on the roll. 2 in 50 a less than an hour at one polling place? I hope that was the exception today.
The City Had polling problems.
If you know anybody who has one tweet #spdldmavote. WE’ve been retweeting some and forwarding some from others. Problems seemed to settle down over afternoon.
cephmesays
When I last got a head count in the ward at 2pm, we had 613 voters. Our ward is on the small side and only had about 900 voters in 2008. Warren campaign had a watcher, a logger, and a sign holder there all day. Pretty hopeful.
1488 voted out of approximately 2500 registered at 4.30 pm.
liveandletlivesays
which means we have a problem. Says Dem turnout is low. Get out the vote NOW!!!!!
afertigsays
In Malden and Medford I’m hearing about some lines at the polls. I am sure that’s the case elsewhere, especially as folks vote after work. Please make sure people stay in line and vote! We’re providing coffee and snacks for voters at the polls — I hope all you are doing the same.
fenway49says
We voted at about 7:30 AM and turnout seemed pretty high for the first half hour or hour. We then spent several hours knocking on doors on the other side of town and I held signs outside my polling place for a couple of hours. Precinct captain reported we were over 1,200 by 6 PM, which is not as high as we’d hoped, but apparently other precincts are seeing pretty high turnout here.
Really hope this one works out!
afertigsays
I’m hearing reports of an hour long line in one of the precincts (sorry, don’t know which) in Winthrop. We just sent like 10 pizzas over there from our HQ. Pizza is on the way! If you’re in Winthrop, stay in line!
Also sent pizzas over to polling location in and near Davis Sq. in Somerville — heard there are long lines there.
liveandletlivesays
Yay!!!!!!
jconwaysays
Times still having Tisei ahead though, but Warren is more important. And the swing states are looking good thus far *fingers totally crossed and toes too*
afertig says
Hearing reports of folks having long lines at the polls in Medford. This is a really good sign – looks like high turnout all around.
No voting irregularities except the usual run of the mill stuff, like the occasional Warden not letting pollchecker sit close enough to sign-in table to hear. Otherwise, smooth operation.
tblade says
I voted about 10 minutes ago, about 7:20am.
When I got to check in, there was an “AV” next to my name. The election worker told me that I couldn’t vote because I had requested an absentee ballot, which I had not done. I continued to insist that I did not request an absentee ballot. An election clerk came over and send that I could vote here, but it must be noted onthe rolls that I voted in person. It was unsettling to say the least. Also, this is the second problem I had at this polling place; during the primary I was told I was on the inactive voter list and was asked for photo ID with the reason given that I did not return the city cencus – which I absolutely did, twice!
To top off the voting experience, between the AV surprise and my rush to get to work, I totally forgot to vote on all the ballot measures!
bluefreak says
I had the same issue in Mansfield (precinct 5).
Out of curiosity, did you vote absentee in the primary? I was chatting with one of the other members of our town committee and she had the exact same issue as I did (voted absentee in the primary, did not file for (or receive) an absentee ballot in the general election, flagged AV in the voter roll). The warden allowed both of us to vote on a regular ballot, but this does appear to be a screw-up on the part of the SoS’ office.
tblade says
And, as I mentioned, I had difficulty then, too.
I have not voted absentee since I moved to Waltham.
I should mention also that turnout looked solid in South Waltham with a short wait in line; I arrived at 7:11 and was out 15 mins later.
David says
I voted at about 8 am, after having waited in line for about 20 minutes. I was #163. Seems like high turnout – we rarely have lines that long.
afertig says
Are others experiencing long lines? Anybody turned away from voting?
David says
Nobody turned away – everything seemed to be going very smoothly. A cop barked unnecessarily loudly at an Obama sign-holder who had ventured too close to the polling place, but otherwise it was uneventful.
sco says
Checking in from our GOTV office in Watertown — polls are packed! Lines are long everywhere, which I take as a good sign.
ChrisinNorthAndover says
who lives in the same precinct as me in Andover was #229 at 8:10 this morning. She said the polling location was pretty busy, but no issues voting.
Steve Stein says
was as busy as I’ve ever seen it this morning. Took about 20 minutes to vote.
centralmassdad says
Got there at 7:15. Hour-long wait. Was number 275.
That is probably bad for Warren in my neighborhood, but good for her if it is a general trend.
tedf says
No line at all at 7:45! I think there was more of a line at Holy Name, across the street, which is a West Roxbury precinct.
HR's Kevin says
No line at 4:30 when I voted, but there was a lot of activity and sheet for my street looked like most people were already checked off, so I think there must have been good turnout this morning.
smadin says
Decent line at the Columbus Elementary School. Waited ten or twelve minutes; I was voter #254 at 8:34 AM. Everyone seemed in good spirits, and the school bake sale was doing reasonable business.
Cheers, Blue Mass Group, it’s been a while.
dca-bos says
Was in line this morning around 6:50 and there were already about 40-50 people waiting for the doors to open. Voted around 7:10 and was #42. My wife went a bit later and voted around 8:00 and was about #250, so heavy turnout but they were moving people through pretty quickly.
bluewatch says
Over an hour wait. People are leaving in frustration.
Bob Neer says
Warren’s base is turning out.
hesterprynne says
8:15 to 9:00. Voters mostly patient.
betsey says
Does anyone know how easy it will be for a non-campaign worker to get into the Warren party at the Fairmont Copley tonight? I have scoured the internets for info, to no avail…
Thanks!
~Bets
NewtonJack says
I was in line at 7:10, out just before 7:30. #82 in my precinct. Mood was generally friendly (if a bit sleepy) and it didn’t seem that anyone was having any issues with access. The election warden as well as the poll watchers are well known in our precinct and are generally respected and well liked by our community. I don’t expect there will be any problems there today.
Al says
Much heavier turnout than normal by 9:30 AM based on machine count when submitting ballot.
liveandletlive says
Standing out for the after work crowd and voting this afternoon. Go Elizabeth!!!
The 'Cuse says
No Elizabeth Warren signholders outside the Southeast School, but a handful of Romney/Brown ones. There was a truck with a large Warren sign parked on the street.
For the primary, when I voted I was #6 or #8 in my precinct (2B) to vote an hour after the polls opened. This time, an hour into polling, I was #132. VERY busy, but almost no wait (less than a minute), they were getting us through pretty quickly. For the first time since I’ve been voting there (11 years now), there were (I assume) poll watchers sitting to the side of the check-in table crossing names off their own clipboard lists as the check-in woman called our names out.
Also, in front of me in line was a middle-aged nurse with a hispanic accent who was voting in her first-ever election. She was nervous and had a poll worker accompany her throughout the process, and when she put her ballot into the scantron machine and the poll worker said “That’s it! You just voted, congratulations!” she was SO amazed an excited. It was one of those scenes that makes you realize how important voting is, and why no one should ever take that right for granted.
purplemouse says
11:45 packed but no wait. #783 pushing 30% turnout thus far. Not sure what heavy turn out means here in a very red part of the commonwealth, other than lots of people are voting.
sabutai says
M’borough busier than I remember 2008 being. Huge turnout.
Poll clerk telling voters that she hopes “the best man wins tonight”. Was visibly annoyed when I reminded her that a woman was running for president and was on our ballots.
SomervilleTom says
I talked to a poll worker, he said “enormous turnout, probably record.” He expects a 95% turnout. I was voter number 615, at 12:10p. I waited in line for an hour and fifteen minutes.
There were problems with the scanning machine, corrected after an hour. The clerk said the machines have performed flawlessly in the past, but cannot handle today’s turnout. Mayor Curtatone stopped by, thanked us for waiting, and said lines are longer in other Somerville polling places.
This is all good for Elizabeth Warren. I hope it’s like this nationwide.
bluewatch says
A problem with the scanning machine is a very serious issue. What was the problem? What happened to resolve it? Was somebody from the Warren campaign notified?
dcsohl says
The scanning machine at my precinct was jammed for a couple of minutes. They were able to get it working though quickly enough.
bluewatch says
How did they get it working without missing any votes?
If they turned it off, they might have wiped previous votes.
Was the Warren poll watcher notified?
It’s a serious issue.
dcsohl says
The various pollwatchers *and* a police officer were all involved in clearing it up. It said that I was voter #226 so I’m pretty confident it didn’t get powered off or lose data.
SomervilleTom says
They halted voting for about an hour, the police came and workers swapped out the scanning machine and set up the new one while police watched. There were election officials (including the Mayor) all over the place.
I couldn’t actually see what was happening in the polling place during all this, the place was packed and the lines were snaking all through the building.
bluewatch says
If they swapped out a voting machine, there is a possibility that all of the votes on the old machine were lost. Did anybody notify the Warren observers? What happened to the old machine? Remember, each machine has a separate memory card which records all of the votes as they occur.
mike_cote says
they can, I believe, just rescan the ballots upto that point. I would hope that the observers would be prepared for that possibility. Maybe my hope is misplaced, but having been an observer in the past, such things are expected and the scanned ballots provide a paper trail.
bluewatch says
It is probably necessary to re-scan the ballots, but did they actually do the re-scan? Remember, a paper trail is only helpful if there is a recount.
Laurel says
There was a 30 minute wait to vote, with about 75 people in line in front of us. And we got there just before the pre-lunch rush.
Christopher says
…our poll checkers at one location are reporting police being, shall we say, zealous about enforcing rules regarding where they can position themselves. Also Senator Brown spent the morning up here.
cat-servant says
Just voted at 2PM, was voter #420 or so (Machine was around 842, but each voter was casting 2 ballots). For my apartment-and-student-heavy precinct this was very high. There even was a tiny little line in the middle of the day!
sharoney says
At 3 pm I was voter #970 out of 2, 325 registered voters in my town. That’s a VERY high turnout sofar–perhaps even a record. There are twice the number of Dems as Repubs here, but their combined total is still below the number of independents, who have traditionally voted Dem.
When I showed up they had five election workers checking off names going in, and three going out. The usual is two each. There was only one person in front of me in my line. In our town everyone knows everyone else, so things went pretty smoothly. I didn’t notice any shenanigans.
But we’ll see…
makemediamatter says
You will love it
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJNjhdQQtRk&feature=share&list=ULPJNjhdQQtRk
Made by me
WhiskeyRebellion says
shared it on Facebook. 🙂
tudor586 says
I voted at approximately 3:30 PM at Ward 4 Precinct 1 in Boston. The ballot is two pages long, and each page has to be separately fed into the scanner. The counter registered 1999 when I submitted my second page. That would be approximately 999 votes cast in my precinct, which is a lot, but I’m not sure about the percentage. No line but it was busy for mid-afternoon. Very different from the turnout in January 2010 for the Brown-Coakley Special Election.
dcsohl says
As of 3PM, at least 2 precincts in Natick (#1 and #3) already had over 50% turnout!
methuenprogressive says
Our group were voters #152 through #166 at 7:50 AM. It was very crowded,A Methuen Police Officer we know said that twice young voters were turned away because even though they had registered at the DMV months ago, their names were not on the roll. 2 in 50 a less than an hour at one polling place? I hope that was the exception today.
mski011 says
The City Had polling problems.
If you know anybody who has one tweet #spdldmavote. WE’ve been retweeting some and forwarding some from others. Problems seemed to settle down over afternoon.
cephme says
When I last got a head count in the ward at 2pm, we had 613 voters. Our ward is on the small side and only had about 900 voters in 2008. Warren campaign had a watcher, a logger, and a sign holder there all day. Pretty hopeful.
Bob Neer says
1488 voted out of approximately 2500 registered at 4.30 pm.
liveandletlive says
which means we have a problem. Says Dem turnout is low. Get out the vote NOW!!!!!
afertig says
In Malden and Medford I’m hearing about some lines at the polls. I am sure that’s the case elsewhere, especially as folks vote after work. Please make sure people stay in line and vote! We’re providing coffee and snacks for voters at the polls — I hope all you are doing the same.
fenway49 says
We voted at about 7:30 AM and turnout seemed pretty high for the first half hour or hour. We then spent several hours knocking on doors on the other side of town and I held signs outside my polling place for a couple of hours. Precinct captain reported we were over 1,200 by 6 PM, which is not as high as we’d hoped, but apparently other precincts are seeing pretty high turnout here.
Really hope this one works out!
afertig says
I’m hearing reports of an hour long line in one of the precincts (sorry, don’t know which) in Winthrop. We just sent like 10 pizzas over there from our HQ. Pizza is on the way! If you’re in Winthrop, stay in line!
Also sent pizzas over to polling location in and near Davis Sq. in Somerville — heard there are long lines there.
liveandletlive says
Yay!!!!!!
jconway says
Times still having Tisei ahead though, but Warren is more important. And the swing states are looking good thus far *fingers totally crossed and toes too*
liveandletlive says
mine too.