Scenes from my 'hood on election day

This morning, I drove by a few precincts in my neighborhood on my way to the dry cleaner's. First was the Virginia-Highland fire station, which had a line stretching down the street on N. Highland. This picture doesn't do the line justice--I drove for a good 5-10 seconds before I could find my phone and snap a picture. There were at least 150 people in line.



Next, I went to my usual polling place: Inman Middle School. When I voted here in February, the line nearly wrapped around the entire gymnasium and it took me two hours to vote. Today, I didn't even make it inside the gym to check out the line...because it already extended out the door of the entire school. Those people are for a long day.



After the drycleaner, I headed downtown to drop off my absentee ballot at Fulton County Elections headquarters. It didn't take me long to find a parking space or walk to the Fulton County Government Center, but I did get distracted along the way by a gaggle of folks waiting for something to happen at the Courthouse across the street:



In line for security at 141 Pryor St., I was dismayed to see a security guard telling people that there was no voting inside the building today...and at least 4 or 5 discouraged people got out of the line. Apparently a lot of people mistakenly believed they could still just vote at the early voting locations today, rather than having to find their actual precinct.

I also heard from the guy in line in front of me that he had come to the county headquarters because the Secretary of State's poll locator website was down, and he needed to find out where his precinct was. But how many people won't have the time to do all that, and will be discouraged from voting because they can't find out where to go? A lot of first time voters are confused, it seems.

When I got up to the Elections office, I was amazed to see tables and tables of yellow absentee ballot cards being sorted. I went to a big official ballot box, where my ballot was stamped as received and then I got to place it in the box for something approximating a real voting experience. I couldn't take a picture of all that, but I did sneak a blurry one of the absentee ballot sorting that's already underway:



After all that and paying $5 to park for the 15 minutes it took me to make my way through security and deliver my ballot, I headed to the office. Across the street is a library that is apparently a polling place as well, also with a line out the door:



I arrived to a virtual ghost town of an office, with most people showing up in the last hour after making early morning treks to their polling locations. It is incredibly exciting to see everyone making time to wait in the long lines and do their civic duty. It makes this often too cynical girl mighty proud.