Kentucky Secretary of State Michael Adams is trying something new to encourage people to volunteer at the polls this year: an online recruitment portal.
The site also offers information about requirements for the job. Adams said shortly after he was first elected in 2019, before taking office, he told a legislative committee there was a poll worker crisis. He said the bottom line is, you can’t have elections without them.
“You have to have places for people to vote, and you have to have poll workers to man those and there's no question about it, we have fewer places to vote today than we did 10 years ago. And it's partly because locations are souring on this and it's partly because volunteers are declining.”
Adams said he hopes people who can’t take Election Day off will consider volunteering for an early voting day.
“Saturday is not just an easy day to vote. It's an easy day to be a poll worker. So I would encourage people that are interested, if you aren't a poll worker, because you can't take Tuesday off work, we totally understand maybe you can do it on Saturday.”
Adams said the hours are shorter on early voting days, too. Poll workers are paid, including for the mandatory training time.
The election worker portal is accessible via the Kentucky Secretary of State's office website.
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