All hands on deck in Elections Office
Elections Office staffers join with Kootenai County employees from other departments to mail out an unprecedented number of absentee ballots. “One of the things that’s come out of all of this is just the teamwork everyone has been showing,” Elections Office manager Shelly Amos said.
Image courtesy of Shelly Amos
The Kootenai County Elections Office has mailed out more than 11,000 absentee ballots, with still a month before the May 19 primary election. This rolling cart holds just the outgoing absentee ballots prepared Friday, from 8 am to 2 pm. "It's unheard of," Elections Office manager Shelly Amos told The Press. (Courtesy of Shelly Amos)
COEUR d’ALENE — Those working in the Kootenai County Elections Office are not having to endure a common public enemy: boredom.
The office is processing a record-breaking number of outgoing ballots in its Third Street offices, with county employees trying to mail out ballots as quickly as the requests arrive.
“It’s been busier than ever,” elections manager Shelly Amos said. “It’s been crazy. Absolutely crazy.”
In the May 2018 primary election, the Elections Office sent out 4,082 absentee ballots. This year — through last Thursday with a month still to go before Election Day — the office has sent out 11,542 absentee ballots.
“We’ve been grossly busy,” Amos said after absorbing the staggering numbers. “Grossly busy is the only way I can describe it right now.”
The busywork comes after Idaho Secretary of State Lawerence Denney and Gov. Brad Little moved to hold the May 19 primary election as absentee-only. Since the April 1 decision, the Secretary of State’s website has been flooded with requests for mail-in ballots. Statewide, elections offices have seen approximately 121,000 requests as of Friday, two-thirds of which came after the April 1 announcement.
Amos’s office has also received calls since Denney announced that certain grocers — including Safeways and Albertsons in Coeur d’Alene — would accept return envelopes that were sent off to voters without the proper postage attached. She said Kootenai County residents would have nothing to worry about.
“Kootenai County [ballots have] all its postage paid,” she said. “Nobody here is going to have to worry about that. We’re thankful to Albertsons and Safeway supporting us and the voters of Idaho, but here in Kootenai County, all our ballots have the right postage.”
Elections Office officials haven’t only been sending out ballots; they’ve been getting them back, as well. Amos said her office has received approximately 800 returned ballots — 500 of which came back Thursday alone.
“We’re also seeing quite a bit of foot traffic,” Amos reported. “We’ve had anywhere from 50 to 80 people a day come into our office for help or to get information about their absentee ballots. People have taken a real interest in participating in this election, which is great.”
Amos stressed that while her staff has stood tough during an unprecedented workload, they haven’t stood alone.
“We’ve had a lot of support from other departments in the county,” she said. “We’ve had people from the District Court, for example, who’ve come over to help since they haven’t had quite the workload. We’ve had an army of helpers come over; we’ve had employees stay late. We’ve had this 20-person crew that’s really made this a lot more manageable.”
Amos added the office has a lot of work still ahead, as Election Day isn’t until May 19.
“The mailbox is getting very full,” she said, “and it’ll be full tomorrow, too. We’ve got all six lines running here in the office. It’s like Election Day every day, all day long.”
