For many Seward County residents, voting day can be a bit of a reunion as they are greeted by election workers who have for many years kept their precinct’s election running smoothly.
“The people who work there and the people who come in to vote are neighbors,” Seward County Clerk Brandy Johnson said. “Some people who have done it look forward to it, and they are proud of it. They have so much knowledge.”
Each election cycle the county clerk, who is also the county’s election commissioner, has to organize the polls. Often that means filling in some new faces among the returning poll workers.
She will soon be working through her lists and lining up the men and women who will run polling places for the primary election on May 12. Persons interested in applying can also do so from the county’s website sewardcounty.gov/election-office.
As outlined in Nebraska Statute 32, poll workers are similar to those serving on jury duty, in that the county reviews voter registrations to invite – and potentially draft – people for each precinct unless they have nominations from the Republican and Democrat political parties.
Under Nebraska law, poll workers must be registered voters of good character and repute, able to read and write in English. They are paid for their time and effort.
Like those called for jury duty, they are protected from losing their regular jobs by the state statute if the county calls upon them to serve and they do not have ill health or other “good and reasonable” reasons to be excused.
Johnson and Tracy Phillips, who serves as deputy election commissioner, have until April 10 to appoint the judges, clerks and inspectors outlined in the state statute for each of Seward County’s precincts. Each precinct can include five poll workers, so that is 80 people for the county’s 16 precincts.
Two parties can nominate
But the process starts with the Republican and Democrat county central committees having the options to inform the clerk if they have recommendations for who should serve in the roles. They have until Feb. 2 to submit those recommendations.
Johnson said the parties do not often submit names, and when that deadline passes, or if the submitted nominees are not able to serve, it is up to the clerk’s office to recruit those poll workers – and a few alternates – to get the election going.
According to Nebraska Statute 32-223, each precinct has two judges, two clerks and an inspector appointed to work the polling place. One judge and one clerk will be registered voters of the political party casting the highest number of votes in the county in the last gubernatorial or presidential election, and one judge and one clerk will be registered voters in the party casting the second highest number of votes in that election.
In Seward, where 7,138 registered Republicans and 6,667 people voted for the Republican presidential candidate in 2024, that means one judge and one clerk position will be assigned to Republicans.
Another judge and clerk position will be assigned to Democrats, the party that had 2,193 registered members in Seward County and the county recorded 2,388 votes for the Democratic presidential candidate in 2024.
A third judge may also be appointed for a precinct, based on the third-highest party turnout in the last election if that party had at least 10% of the total number of voters voting. The other registered parties in Seward County do not constitute 10% of the total number of voters turning out in 2024, so a Republican voter would be appointed.
The county’s 2,193 non-partisan registrations exceed the 10% level of eligible voters, but because they or specific candidates are not affiliated with any party, those voters are not factored into the poll worker pool. They would not be considered unless the clerk cannot fill the prescribed roles or potential substitute workers are needed.
State statute indicates all precinct and district inspector roles will be divided between the parties in proportion to the number of votes cast in the last election.
Because of the allocation of poll workers by statute, Seward County does not usually have poll workers who are registered as nonpartisan or smaller party voters.
Workers train for day
Poll workers are at the polling places from 7 a.m. until the polls close at 8 p.m. and the last qualified voters have cast their ballots. By law, if people are waiting in line at 8 p.m. when polling places are to close, the voting continues until they have had a chance to vote.
“For some of these elections there are people waiting at the door” before 8 a.m., too, she said.
But by the time they set up the polling places, complete the voting and close up shop with the votes turned in to the county clerk’s office, some may work a 14-hour day, she said.
The clerk’s staff and Seward County sheriff’s deputies assist with some poll issues throughout the day, which might include delivering additional ballots or provisional voting envelopes, all of which are tracked and counted.
(By the end of the day Johnson and Phillips will reconcile all printed ballots – how many were cast, any that were spoiled and the number left over.)
Poll workers are trained to understand the voting system, how things like the Express Machine works to let voters with specific needs more easily cast their ballots, and what to do when a voter has moved to another precinct, and other situations that may arise.
Occasionally they will have to inform voters of polling place rules – like the ban on wearing campaign-specific clothing or hats, or talking about candidates on the premises. But Johnson said for the most part, people comply quickly.
A few alternates will train, also, in case someone is ill on election day.
In 2024, 11,583 people were registered to vote in Seward County and 9,378 votes were cast in that election, an 80.96% turnout.
That was slightly higher than the state’s 76.30 percentage for voter turnout based on 965,236 individuals voting from among the 1,263,487 registered.
In 2024, the county also reported 148 Libertarian voters registered, 41 Legal Marijuana NOW voters, and 9 No Labels Nebraska voters registered in 2024, according to information on the Secretary of State’s website.
Votes cast for those smaller party candidates were 85 for the Libertarian presidential candidate and 21 for the Legal Marijuana NOW candidate, with 23 Seward County voters (of any party or non-party affiliation) writing in candidates.
