Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 2, 1994 TAG: 9403020052
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MEGAN SCHNABEL STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The excitement level at the table rose a few degrees as the women craned their necks to see out the front windows.
"Look, there's a car. Somebody else is coming?"
It was a question, not a given. Unfulfilled expectations had been the case too often for them to take anything for granted.
"No, they're just turning around."
"Should have known. They're usually just turning around."
So went the day at the Jefferson Center gymnasium, polling place for Roanoke's Highland I precinct, the loneliest precinct in the city during Tuesday's Democratic primary.
By noon, 28 of the precinct's 610 registered voters had come out to cast their ballots, and the four election officials who were in charge of the site were trying to find something to keep themselves occupied.
"We've been joking around - just something to keep us awake and alert," said Mary Campbell, who had been at the polling site since 5 a.m. and would be there until closing at 7 p.m.
"We even had our own K&W restaurant out here today," she said with a laugh, gesturing toward a table laden with vegetable trays and other snacks.
And then a voter - a real voter, not someone just passing through the lobby on the way to the basketball game in the gym - walked through the door, and the women were all business.
Elizabeth Emmons, the precinct chief and a longtime resident of the area, greeted the man by name, then asked him for his name and address.
"I know just about everybody, but I still need their name and address," Emmons said, checking him off her master list before sending him on to Margaret Barbour, who stood guard at the single voting booth.
Emmons, who has been working elections for 30 years, said it was one of the slower elections days she had seen. But she expected it to pick up at least a little bit later in the day.
"The primary elections are always slow," said Robin Emmons, Elizabeth Emmons' daughter and an election worker for eight years. People just aren't used to voting in March, she said.
A little while later, another voter came in, and the women again stopped their conversation to guide her through the process. As the curtain on the booth closed behind the voter, the women on duty agreed that there just hadn't been enough publicity about the election.
"I didn't know anything about it until they called me," Robin Emmons said. More voters would have turned out, even for just a primary, if it had been better publicized, she said.
"It'll pick up later," her mother said again, optimistically. "People will come in after work."
And the women settled back down into their between-voters conversation.
Keywords:
POLITICS
by CNB