Students who were registered to vote at two Evanston polling locations waited in lines for more than two hours Tuesday, the result of a paperwork backlog and a voter pool twice as large as normal in a single precinct, election officials said.
The line at the Seabury-Western Theological Seminary wound in circles and up the stairs Tuesday evening, forcing many students to wait between an hour and an hour and a half to vote.
“This is why youth apathy happens,” said Education junior Becky Russler, who voted by absentee ballot but was outside the seminary. “If it takes two hours to vote, who gives a shit?”
At Evanston Public Library, 1703 Orrington Ave., several students left when they saw the line filling the lobby.
“I’m just going to come back later,” said Medill sophomore Desi Gallegos, who poked his head in the library door, gaped at the line and quickly turned around. “There’s no way I can handle this right now. It’s pretty daunting.”
Though a typical precinct has 450 to 700 registered voters, about 1,200 people were registered to vote at the library, said election judge Bruce Baumberger. Others estimated the number of registered voters to be closer to 1,500.
Baumberger said Northwestern student groups’ last-minute voter registration drives flooded the city clerk’s office with registration forms that could not be processed in time for the election. When many students got to the front of the line, he said, the city did not have a record of them.
These voters then had to fill out a separate form instead of merely signing the pre-printed version, a process that slowed down the lines and prevented students without proof of their addresses from voting.
Another problem, Baumberger said, was that students who had moved did not re-register and had to fill out a detailed form when they got to the front of the line.
“(The wait) is really a concern for everybody,” he said. “People would like to come in for 10 minutes and be on their way. But the reality is that it takes time.”
He said the close nature of the presidential race and student groups’ get-out-the-vote campaigns triggered a voter turnout greater than expected, making the lines even longer.
Jeanne Cleveland, a member of the Democratic Party of Evanston, said polling officials turned away some students even though they had already registered to vote, because their signatures were not on record at the polling site.
If enough students decided not to vote, she said, it could impact Democratic races statewide.
“The lines are inordinately long,” she said. “The only two precincts where we have a line at 3 p.m. is where Northwestern students are voting.”
Bernstein said election officials realized there would be more people voting than normal, so they had nine workers at the library instead of five.
Even so, students still had to wait in the hourlong line at the library, some even waiting only to realize they were in the wrong polling place.
“I just waited an hour for nothing,” said Speech sophomore Ian Forester. “Maybe it’s my fault but, really, how was I supposed to know? I don’t know if I’ll vote now. I have so much other stuff I have to get done.”
Though many students said they resented the wait, they said they felt obligated to vote.
“You only vote for president every four years,” Weinberg junior Astara Barker said while waiting in line at the library. “If you miss this opportunity, you won’t get it again.”
Other students said the long line would force them to miss class or be late for work. Weinberg freshman Jolene Frank said many students tried to vote in between classes, a plan made impossible by the long lines.
“I just don’t want to wait four more years before I get to vote for the president,” said Frank, who voted for the first time Tuesday. “I know it’s going to be a close race.”
