Paco Hope on Nostr: A couple more posts and I’ll stop. It’s 22:45 local time. We finished closing at ...

A couple more posts and I’ll stop. It’s 22:45 local time. We finished closing at 21:00 I drove home and have finally had a bite to eat and put my feet up. This was by far my worst closing ever. We should be able to do it in 90 minutes. 60 if you’re a team of seasoned pros. 120 minutes is long. Not the longest, but too long.

Some thoughts on closing the #election.

1. #FairfaxCounty election checklists are good. Real good. They are so good that when I got a defective piece of kit and I was following instructions, I assumed it was me. I couldn’t imagine they’d tell me to do something that couldn’t be done.

2. Reading and following written instructions in English is not a universal skill. Some people are not good at it. The checklists and instructions are clear. They have pictures for every step. But I had 2 officers with limited English skills, and following checklists was hard.

3. If you have limited English vocabulary, then you might not have learned words like “grommet” and “bungee cord” and “lanyard”. It makes following instructions hard. I had to really hold some hands. For example, I think one officer really didn’t read much English. When I assigned her the duty of bringing in signs from outside, she went all sorcerer’s apprentice and brought all kinds of signs: candidate campaign signs, our signs, even a sign for a school fundraiser. I think she simply couldn’t read them and didn’t know what they were for. Even as the instructions I handed her had pictures of the signs she is meant to bring in.

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