Behind the scenes at poll worker training: Residents say they’re eager to serve their community amid a tense election season

In the county where a lone gunman attempted to assassinate former President Donald Trump within this pivotal swing state, poll workers are preparing for a once-monotonous job that is now the subject of national attention.

That was apparent during a recent class at the Cranberry Municipal Center, where most seats were filled late on a Tuesday night. 

Butler County Bureau of Elections employee Adam Price emphasized doing everything by the book — literally, as the class reviewed over 50 pages of a guidebook.

“Details are important,” said Price, the county’s precinct and poll worker coordinator. “We will all have a lot of scrutiny of our work this fall.” 

With 19 Electoral College votes, Pennsylvania could easily determine who wins the presidency. Several polls show the race is a virtual toss-up between Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, according to RealClear Polling.

That increased attention on the outcome of Pennsylvania comes alongside more enthusiasm from poll workers. Several counties in Southwestern Pennsylvania have seen an increased interest, with Allegheny and Westmoreland nearly meeting or exceeding their needs for poll workers.

In Butler, Price said the 2020 race has not only brought more interest in elections but also more interest in being poll workers. 

Bruce Knoechel, 73, has been the judge of elections in Zelienople since 2016. He said he had been paying close attention to elections over the past several years, and when a group of women who had been running elections in the community for many years could no longer continue, he and other residents stepped in to take over the responsibility.

During the class, he and other poll workers were given a flyer from the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency on conflict de-escalation. 

Knoechel, however, is not nervous and said he has no concerns over violence “in the small town of Zelienople.” 

His confidence extends to handling the stress of a presidential election on Nov. 5.

“I’m very confident we’ll be able to manage it because of the experience of the people that I have working with me,” Knoechel said.

Like Knoechel, Jaclyn Dean, 41, of Adams Township, said she felt compelled to work the polls two years ago when she saw that many election workers were senior citizens.

It was a good fit for Dean, who described herself as “very organized and detail-oriented” shortly after reviewing the guidebook over the course of the training class.

“It’s a couple days out of the year. It’s not a ton of time, you know, a huge time commitment other than a really, really long workday,” she said. “But I felt like it was something little that was still significant to provide some sort of impact.” 

The job, however, doesn’t come without some stress. 

While she’s not concerned about violence in Adams, it’s her first time working a presidential election. Dean has been a poll worker for four elections over two years and was just appointed judge of elections for a new precinct. 

“I think there’s a lot more, I guess, stress around things, and a lot of differing opinions,” she said. “It’s going to be interesting to see how that plays out on Election Day compared to past elections, so [I’m] a little bit anxious about that, especially just compared to some of the past ones.”
 
But for Dean, being a poll worker gave her an opportunity to learn about the inner workings of the electoral process.

“It’s actually kind of fun being a poll worker,” she said. “Seeing all the stuff that goes on behind the scenes is really interesting, and how it kind of translates to the actual election itself.”

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