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I was new to working at a polling place in the late 70’s in Costa Mesa. What a terrible experience! Arrived early at the designated address - someone’s garage and there wasn’t any preparation - no tables, no chairs. In the days of no cell phones to call the county to get direction on “what do we do now” and the owner of the house not home to let us use their phone. I think neighbors who came to vote went back to get tables and chairs when they saw our plight. We managed to get going and managed to close at the proper time. My husband and I took the ballot boxes to Santa Ana late at night to drop off and that had never been discussed beforehand. I was the last one there so guess it fell to me and my husband came to the rescue.

I remember early in the day as voters arrived, an older woman also working there told me I had to keep track of the NUMBER of the paper ballot on the sign in sheet so they could match everything later on if needed. I told her that certainly wasn’t any part of our training and I wasn’t going to do it. Wanted to call her a crazy old bat but held back. I was in my mid ‘30’s at the time so I was pretty gutsy but with common sense.

I think as old as she was even then she went on to give advice on voting in 2020 somewhere in the country!!