Primary election may move to June
Gov. Tom Wolf mentioned during a live-streamed news conference Monday afternoon that the State Legislature is working on a bill to move the April 28 primary to June.
The Philadelphia Inquirer reported Tuesday, June 2, as the targeted date.
When Washington County Elections Director Melanie Ostrander learned of a likely change, she said, “I was relieved because the majority of our poll workers are considered vulnerable because of their age.
“We were losing poll workers who were declining to work this election because of the potential health risk.”
A second week of poll worker training on new voting machines and a scanner that produces a paper trail was canceled in Washington County.
“And it was not confirmed, but there was a possibility we would lose some polling locations because many of our polls are in schools and churches,” Ostrander said.
The governor ordered schools to close March 13, not resuming classes until April, and many congregations have chosen to shut their doors to keep the novel coronavirus from spreading.
“They had not confirmed if they were still willing to allow us, but our assumption was that they would not,” Ostrander said.
A June 2 primary would still take place within the deadline for the California Area School District tax referendum. School districts must adopt budgets setting property tax levies no later than June 30 of every year.
Ostrander noted that anyone who is leery about voting in person can still apply through April 21 for a no-excuse mail-in or absentee ballot if there is a concern about being out in public. Absentee ballots can be obtained by contacting a county elections office, by visiting votespa.com and printing a form, or by applying online at the same website.
The Washington County elections office last week received an additional 500 absentee ballot applications, bringing the total to 2,549. Of this number, there were requests for 1,343 no-excuse mail-in ballots and 1,157 requests for “traditional” absentee ballots.
The rest of the ballot requests came from members of the military and civilians living overseas.