S.D. election officials take new approaches to voting amid pandemic (Preview)

By Nick Lowrey and Bart Pfankuch, SD News Watch

Editor’s note: This article was produced through a partnership between South Dakota News Watch and the Solutions Journalism Network, a national non-profit group that supports rigorous journalism about responses to problems.

South Dakota election officials are taking a wide range of steps — and implementing some creative measures — to ensure easy access to voting and provide for an accurate ballot count during a time of unprecedented electoral challenges.

The 2020 general election is being held amid a deadly pandemic, is attracting record numbers of absentee and early votes and is drawing high voter turnout.

County election officials who run ground-level electoral operations in South Dakota have been working for months to manage early voting and prepare for safe, orderly in-person voting on Election Day on Nov. 3.

Many strategies have focused on processing absentee ballots, which by law cannot be counted until Election Day.

Election officials have recruited more poll workers as some older workers sought to avoid the risk of COVID-19. Some counties have formed absentee ballot review panels to sort and certify ballots and created new, absentee-only voting precincts to simplify the vote-counting process. Temporary ballot boxes have been installed in some areas so voters do not have to send in their ballots by mail. The state has also held several mock elections to test its voting systems and prepare county auditors for a long, busy Election Day.

Auditors have also found ingenious ways to overcome electoral challenges. One auditor held a voter education session through the windows of a nursing home to reach elderly voters who could not leave the facility. Another bought and erected a surplus military tent to create a safe, socially distanced early voting site. And a few auditors have taken advantage of a rarely used state law that allows high school students to get excused absences to fill in as temporary poll workers on Election Day.

As with any vote, the stakes are high, but may be higher this election, especially for those tasked with running them. Electoral processes, especially mail-in voting, have come under scrutiny by President Donald Trump. The U.S. Postal Service has battled to keep up with a nationwide flood of mail-in ballots. Record numbers of voters are casting absentee ballots, many for the first time. Some polling locations have been shut down due to the pandemic, and many in-person polling sites will be partially staffed with first-time workers and must focus on maintaining cleanliness and social distancing. Many South Dakota counties are using new ballot-counting machines and technology.

The number of polling locations in South Dakota will be down in 2020. The state had 508 polling sites during the 2016 general election, and as of mid-October, the state had only 474 polling sites secured for the 2020 general election at a time when voter turnout could be as high as 70%, according to Kea Warne, elections director in the Secretary of State’s Office.

Warne, who has worked on South Dakota elections off and on since 1993, said preparing for the 2020 election has been challenging, but rewarding.

“Every election cycle brings its own challenges, but this cycle has definitely been unique in the challenges being faced by election officials,” Warne said. “This has led to most likely the busiest election cycle I have been a part of.”

In the 2020 general election, South Dakota voters can vote for president, seats in the U.S. Senate and U.S. House, a spot on the Public Utilities Commission, three statewide ballot measures on legalizing medical and recreation marijuana and sports betting in Deadwood, and numerous local legislative offices.

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