Fulton County Chairman John Eaves hopes an increase in early voting will help the county avoid many of the election-day issues of years past.
"My level of confidence on election day is very high," he said Tuesday in an editorial board meeting with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
The last two times the country elected a president, Fulton had some problems.
In 2012, the secretary of state fielded more than 100 complaints about irregularities at polling places, problems that resulted in $180,000 in fines for the county.
Hours after the polls opened, workers were still printing voter lists and delivering them to precincts. Some residents were turned away because their names weren’t on the lists, while 9,575 voters were forced to cast provisional ballots.
In 2008, election officials were still counting absentee ballots 53 hours after the voting ended.
But by expanding early voting in the county, Fulton's leadership wants to tackle any problems well in advance of election day.
More than 240,000 people registered to vote in 2016, Eaves said, and by the end of the day Tuesday, more than 110,000 voters had already made their selections. Fulton has more than 738,000 registered voters.
Almost 94 percent of Fulton’s eligible voters are registered, Eaves said. He expects voter turnout to reach 70 percent of those who are eligible.
Those numbers are “phenomenal,” Eaves said.
“The voting process to me right now is off the chain,” Eaves said.
Fulton has opened more early voting locations than any other county in the state, including some mobile “outreach” locations at colleges and senior centers that are only there for a couple days.
The county has also reached out to residents via mailers to make sure they know where to vote, has a system online to let them know how long of a wait they should expect and will have people with tablet computers roaming the lines on election day to make sure voters are in the right place.
While Eaves said the county is being aggressive and innovative in its plans to expand voter access, the candidates have also driven more people to register — and to vote.
“It’s the Donald Trump effect,” he said. “It’s also motivated folks who do not subscribe and support him.”
Eaves said he thinks this year, the integrity of the voting process is good. The county should be ready well ahead of time with its voter lists, he said, and both Democrats and Republicans make up the election board that is watching the election.
“If people knew that, they would be less inclined to say this is a rigged election,” he said. “It’s a very transparent process.”
Eaves’ goal, he said, is to “shatter” the early voting records of the past. To offer 17 days of early voting makes it easier for residents county-wide to make time to vote, he said.
And the large number of early voters will make it easier come Nov. 8, he said.
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