Bad experiences with the system | Modesto Bee

After I finished filling out my ballot Tuesday, a poll worker approached me and said, "Our scanner is broken. You'll have to put your ballot here," and indicated a pile of ballots at the base of the scanner. I told her that would be a problem for me and that I would wait, since a technician was working on the scanner. Within a minute, the scanner was working and I was able to submit my ballot properly.

But what about all those loose ballots? The poll worker said they would be scanned later. These ballots were not secured in any way. That is no way to run a secure election. In fact, it violates what I was taught when being trained as a poll worker in 2006.

Though I called the clerk and recorder's office and reserved a place in the training, my name never appeared on any of the preprinted sign-in lists for training sessions. I was assigned to a precinct for the November 2006 election, but the precinct captain was never informed that I was coming. I decided that I really didn't want to work in such an inefficient system.

LUELLA COLE

Modesto