Luzerne County Election Board approves mail ballot drop box sites

Luzerne County will have mail ballot drop boxes in Pittston, Hazleton, Wilkes-Barre and Wright Township before the Nov. 2 general election, with the possibility of a fifth location in the Back Mountain still up in the air, the county Election Board decided Friday night.

Dallas Township officials had approved a box inside their municipal building, but election board Chairwoman Denise Williams said they later declined after state Rep. Karen Bobeck, R-Dallas, informed the municipality she would be uncomfortable having a box in the area outside the office she occupies inside that building.

Williams said during Friday’s public meeting she does not understand why Bobeck would be uncomfortable because she had supported state legislation authorizing mail ballot voting.

Bobeck could not immediately be reached for comment Friday night on the matter.

While describing her reaction as “disappointed,” Williams said county election officials will continue to search for other options in the Back Mountain. The election board will hold its next meeting Oct. 18.

The county will keep a counter-top drop box at its Penn Place building in downtown Wilkes-Barre.

Three of four new mail box-style boxes will be installed inside the Wright Township Fire Department, Pittston Memorial Library and Hazleton City Hall. The latter two sites had counter-top boxes in this year’s primary.

Election board members changed to the larger boxes for non-county buildings in the general election because they are too heavy and bulky to steal.

The county plans to start sending mail ballots to voters who requested them the end of next week, Deputy Election Director Eryn Harvey told the board.

Addresses, hours and other details about the drop sites will be released soon, officials said. The boxes will all be inside buildings under video surveillance and contain visible signs informing voters they are under surveillance and prohibited from delivering someone else’s ballot unless they are rendering assistance to a disabled or emergency absentee voter. Such third-party deliveries require a declaration signed by both the voter and person providing assistance.

Box observation discussed

The board also discussed the observation of ballot boxes in response to county Councilman Walter Griffith’s recent notification he would be organizing watchers.

In public comment at the start of Friday’s meeting, Griffith said he wants to clarify he is not advocating “accosting a voter in any way” and said he and other volunteers could instead write down dates and times if they spot someone carrying more than one ballot so the county could check that time period on the surveillance footage to determine if anything is amiss.

Griffith said he and other volunteers should be described as “observers,” not poll watchers, and had said they would stand outside of drop box locations if they were not permitted inside.

Williams had pointed to Pennsylvania Department of State guidance stating poll watchers and authorized representatives have no legal right to observe or be present at designated ballot return sites “except to vote their own ballot or to perform personal tasks expressly permitted by the election code.”

Griffith, a candidate for county controller, had said the volunteers may photograph or videotape voters so the information could be shared with election officials.

Assistant Solicitor Paula Radick told the board Friday that any attempts to question, photograph and videotape mail ballot voters would constitute voter intimidation. Williams asked if such an action warrants contacting 911 or law enforcement, and Radick said anyone experiencing or witnessing alleged intimidation is encouraged to report it.

Williams noted voters also can drop off their mail ballots at U.S. Postal boxes, and those boxes are not under video or security surveillance.

Equipment demo

In other election matters, the county held a voting equipment demonstration in the courthouse rotunda Friday.

Harvey said the event was largely intended to answer voters’ questions and remind them that they must feed their paper ballots into the scanner/tabulator for their vote to be counted.