BOSTON (AP) — The Massachusetts secretary of state's office has ordered an overhaul of Boston’s elections practices after some city precincts didn't initially have enough printed ballots on Election Day.
Secretary of State William Galvin said Monday that an investigation determined that even though the city had a sufficient number of ballots in November, it failed to provide enough to several precincts ahead of time. State election laws require that a ballot be available for every voter.
“This resulted in voters in the City experiencing needless and unacceptable delays in voting and, in some cases, disfranchisement because the voter was unable to wait,” said the report's author, Rebecca Murray, who is the general counsel to the secretary of the commonwealth.
The city, which only uses paper ballots, had planned to deliver an amount equal to about 80% of registered voters in each precinct. But a calculation error led to far fewer being sent, according to the investigation report.
Poor communication between the city and polling stations exacerbated the problem, Murray found.
“A major problem that was evident was the inability of the Boston Election Department to directly communicate, in real time, with each voting precinct in order to determine and prioritize those locations that had run out of ballots or had an immediate need for additional ballots,” she concluded.
Mayor Michelle Wu said the city has worked with Galvin's office to come up with “corrective actions” to ensure that the problem doesn't happen again. She also said they are working to modernize the office, including developing a system to ensure that the Election Department can field and respond to every call to it, whether from poll workers or voters, are received.
“This was an unacceptable lapse in terms of ballots not being available when residents needed them,” she told reporters “This is one of the most fundamental charges of government — to administer free and fair elections.”
Galvin ordered the city to change its practices to comply with state election laws and he appointed a person to help with the improvements who will reman in place through the end of 2026. He also ordered it to come up with a plan to “ensure that the City and poll workers can communicate with each other in real time during the election.”
Furthermore, the city must designate a team that contacts polling stations on election days to discuss issues such as voting machine problems and ballot shortages. It also needs to improve training for poll workers on what to do about issues such as ballot shortages, the report found.
Michael Casey, The Associated Press
