Volunteers Prepare for 2024 Election Season

With Super Tuesday right around the corner volunteers are preparing, and have been for the last few days. 

At most locations, you’ll currently see about two or three election officials providing information and collecting ballots.

Volunteers I spoke to say this year’s crowd isn’t as busy in comparison to years in the past.

“It’s been the same everywhere, not a lot of people are dropping off ballots early. Whereas before it was like you, you’d have a lot more by now.” Victor Amey, an Election Official says.

Amey says he’s not expecting to see a rush of voters come in until in-person voting begins.

“I expect to see a lot of people just from past experience and knowing if so many people haven’t came already, it seems like it’s going to be even worse.” Amey says.

There are currently 17 voting centers open, but come Saturday, an additional 131 centers will open county-wide, marking the start of in-person voting.

To prepare for the amount of voters that may step into voting centers, the county adds almost a dozen additional volunteers to each site.

“The center’s gonna have eight to 11 people. There’ll be like three lead officers, and then there’ll be eight officials like election officials that come from throughout the city, or the area,  in this area, people who live in this area.” Amey adds.

With 148 total voting locations across the county, almost every city within the Coachella Valley has more than one.

Locations like the Coachella Community Center, Portola Community Center, Cathedral City Hall, and plenty more are locations where voters can head to.

“See, this is our last day at the drop off voting center. So going forward on Friday is going to be the beginning we’ll set up all of the voting centers. On Saturday, that’s when people will be able to come in and vote.” Amey says.