The Bulloch County commissioners set qualifying fees this week for nine countywide offices and seats on two local boards up for election in 2024. Election Supervisor Shontay Jones recently identified concerns she has for a year that will also include a presidential race and up to five different elections.

Speaking to the Board of Commissioners during a work session 

Nov. 21, Jones noted that more Bulloch County residents voted early in-person than on traditional elections days in both the 2016 and 2020 presidential general elections, as well as in the November 2022 non-presidential general election.

"As you can see through all of the numbers, basically we do more advanced in-person voting than voters that appear on Election Day at the precincts," Jones said.

Georgia's Dec. 6, 2022, runoff between U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock and challenger Herschel Walker was a recent exception in that more voters, a total of 11,765, cast ballots at Bulloch County's widely dispersed 16 traditional precincts on Election Day than voted early. But being a runoff, that election also included a shortened early voting period, in which the 8,489 in-person voters filed through a single compact location — the Board of Elections and Registration office suite of the County Annex on North Main Street — in just five days.

"In those five days here, with the parking being a concern, we voted almost 8,500 people," Jones said.

The commissioners' meeting room, where she was speaking, is in the North Main Annex, which was undergoing a major renovation during the November and December 2022 elections. It is part of the same complex as the County Annex, which the elections office shares with the tax commissioner's and tax assessors' offices.

The renovation closed a portion of the parking at the complex. But parking was already a concern during early voting in previous elections, since most of the early voting occurs during business days and hours when the other county offices are also busy.

The receipt and processing of mailed-out absentee ballots also overlaps with the in-person early voting, which Jones said presents a challenge for staffing.

"We have a large amount of absentee ballots that we mail out, and those will increase," she said. "You know 2020 was different; it was COVID."

During the November 2020 general election that included the Biden-Trump presidential race, pandemic voting rules were in place, before changes in state election law the next year that shortened the time for mailing out absentee ballots and banned outdoor ballot drop boxes. In that election, 14,408 Bulloch County residents voted early in-person, while 8,910 returned paper absentee ballots out of 10,000 mailed out, and 9,298 voted on the final Election Day.

"So no, I've been here in the election office now 24 years, and we've never mailed out 10,000 paper ballots like we did that year, but we have been in different stages where we've mailed out up to 3,000 (or) 2,000 ballots, and that puts a big strain on my office," Jones said.

Mailed ballot staffing

The full-time elections staff consists of Jones and two election assistants, the longer serving Marilyn Frontee and recently added Zachary Pitts. Three other staff members who are "permanent part-time" are called on to work additional hours during early voting weeks, and more help may be needed to handle absentee-by-mail ballots, she said.

An update in the electronic devices known as Poll Pads, installed for the 2023 city election, has eliminated the need for a separate voter-check-in area. So Jones said the room across the lobby previously used for this purpose could be used by an "absentee ballot mail team" with additional staff.

Security and safety

In regard to safety and security, she also alluded to the controversy surrounding the 2020 presidential race and its aftermath, without explicitly mentioning that 2024 could end in a rematch.

"If you … don't remember the news of 2020, there were threats to precincts. A lot of election workers quit. …," Jones said. "But it's coming again. If you heard recently in the news, there was a fentanyl scare where election offices … received some (mail) that had fentanyl residue on it."

Confirming the first week of November that a letter laced with the powerful synthetic opioid had been sent to a Fulton County election official, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger called it an act of domestic terrorism. According to The Associated Press, the FBI and U.S. Postal Inspection Service reported that suspicious letters, including four containing fentanyl, had been sent to elections offices in at least five states.

"So it's a concern for us as election workers because where we are, we're open to the public. … Well, we have security …," Jones said, thanking a Bulloch County sheriff's deputy by first name, "but we've also been blessed that we haven't had the problems that other counties have had."

That deputy checks in on the Board of Elections and Registration office and other County Annex offices each work day, she said in an interview. But he is not at the elections office all of the time.

"Coming up to 2024, depending on who's on the ballot, in my experience when people are really passionate about candidates and what's going on, that's usually when they get a little bit more feisty, so what we could see — and we'll express those concerns to you all as we progress — is that we may need additional security," Jones told the commissioners.

Parking 'concern'

In a handout to the elected commissioners, Jones listed extra security and absentee ballot staffing as "needs" and parking not as a need but as another "concern." It's one that has been discussed at a number of meetings of the appointed elections board.

"Parking, I know y'all have heard it, you're tired of it, but until you move us, you're going to keep hearing it, because that's the number-one thing at our election meetings," she said.

When Commissioners Chairman Roy Thompson later asked Jones where she would suggest the county move the office, she noted that the elections staff and board have "looked into several properties" and brought these to the attention of County Manager Tom Couch.

"I don't think there's going to be an ideal place," Jones said.

But it would need to be large enough to store the voting machine systems currently stored in a basement plus the "voter hub" cabinet tables now on order and also allow space for poll worker training and early voting, she said.

Couch noted that he and Special Projects Director Randy Newman were scheduled to talk to consultants who are prospects to do a master facilities plan for the county government, subject to contract approval by the commissioners early next year.

The elections staff will have input in this planning, Couch said. But the election headquarters is not expected to move during 2024, Jones acknowledged.

County offices up

As part of the consent agenda for their 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 4, meeting, the Board of Commissioners were expected to approve the 2024 qualifying fees for candidates to these countywide elected offices: chairman of the commissioners, State Court solicitor-general, sheriff, clerk of Superior Court, Probate Court judge, tax commissioner, Magistrate Court judge, coroner and county surveyor.

Additionally, candidate fees were to be formally set for district seats on the Board of Commissioners, three of which are up for election, and for four seats on the Board of Education.

The five elections

The year's first election will be the presidential preference primary, March 12, with in-person early voting Feb. 19–March 8. The deadline for voter registration is Feb. 12.

The general primary, including party nominating primaries for county, state legislative and U.S. House races and the general election for nonpartisan offices, will be held May 24. Its runoff election is scheduled for June 18.

Nov. 5 is the general election, and if it requires a runoff, it will be held Dec. 3.