Luzerne County releases figures on voter registration processing

Luzerne County’s election bureau had approximately 4,100 voter registration applications to process as of Monday afternoon — with the lion’s share of it being online, according to a new report.

County Election Director Emily Cook said the bureau had significantly reduced outstanding applications by Friday, but the number shot back up with new arrivals over the weekend.

She emphasized many of these applications the bureau was receiving were duplicates from voters submitting new applications even though they already are registered. Duplicates are consuming limited resources, she said.

Citizens without pending applications should visit pavoterservices.pa.gov to check their registration status before they submit a new one, Cook said.

Cook said the 4,100 figure also includes voters seeking party or address changes and is not solely new registrations.

The bureau currently has five full-time employees with access to the state voter database required to process registration applications, Cook said. Ten county workers from other departments are assisting on weekday nights and weekends, and the state has approved voter database access for them so they also can help with registration processing, Cook said.

Plans also are underway to bring in temporary workers to assist with an inundation of phone calls to the bureau during office hours, she said.

Cook said a large portion of these calls contain a series of “scripted” questions from non-county residents asking the exact same four questions about illegal immigrants, the purging of voter rolls, whether there’s a processing backlog and if the county ordered paper — the latter referring to a November 2022 general election paper shortage.

“These script questions are designed to take bureau employees away from processing applications to sow those seeds of doubt and create those problems they want to find,” Cook said.

Other than the hiring temporary employees already in the works, Cook said she does not need any additional assistance to get current on registrations.

“It’s a matter of doing it and not having the noise surrounding what we’re doing,” Cook said. “That’s what’s getting to be the issue. There’s just too much noise.”

County Manager Romilda Crocamo, who had characterized estimates of thousands of backlogged registrations as a false rumor last week, insisted the county is “on task” and “making staffing adjustments” to ensure every voter is properly registered as soon as possible.

“We’ll have everything completed before statutory deadlines,” Crocamo said.

Mail ballots

The bureau has processed approximately 26,300 mail ballot applications and has around 2,000 outstanding, Cook verified.

Crocamo said the bureau already has proofed all Nov. 5 general election ballots and posted them on the election bureau page at luzernecounty.org. Anyone spotting an issue should email elections@luzernecounty.org, Cook said.

The county Election Board plans to hold an emergency meeting in coming days to officially approve the ballots — a step necessary for the mail ballots to be issued.

Crocamo said the county plans to start sending out the ballots in early October — well before the Oct. 22 state deadline — so voters choosing that option have enough time to complete and return them by regular mail.

Controller review

County Controller Walter Griffith said he met with Cook and other members of the administration Monday to assess the situation and identified staffing as his main concern.

Griffith said he will stay on top of the matter and won’t rest until it is resolved.

“They need help, and they need it now,” Griffith said, noting election bureaus across the state are experiencing similar waves of registration applications.

All pending voter registrations must be processed swiftly because some of these voters may want to vote by mail, which would require an approved registration, Griffith said.

If the volume of phone calls to the bureau remains a distraction, the administration may have to resort to forwarding these lines to other departments, he said.

“I know all offices are busy, but somebody needs to take care of that service, so they’re going to try to work on that problem,” Griffith said.

Griffith said he also stressed the importance for the bureau to prepare for a potential rush of voters interested in the on-demand voting option available after mail ballots are issued.

Once Nov. 5 general election mail ballots are printed and issued, voters can appear in person at the county election bureau to request and complete a mail ballot on the spot. This “on-demand” voting option will only be available for a short window until Oct. 29, which is the last day to apply for mail ballots.

Long lines had formed outside Penn Place when the state started promoting this on-the-spot option before the November 2020 election. Penn Place became a mini voting hub as a result, with campaign demonstrations.

The county added a worker in the Penn Place lobby in 2020 to pre-screen voters to verify whether they were eligible — a step Griffith said is planned again.