Early Voting In New Jersey Is Underway; It’s New & Off To A Good Start

For the first time in New Jersey history, early voting, in advance of the Tuesday, November 2, 2021 General Election is underway.

Nine (9) days of early voting continue through Sunday, October 31, 2021.

In Atlantic County, you can vote at any of these six locations, regardless of where you live in Atlantic County:

EARLY VOTING WILL TAKE PLACE THROUGH SUNDAY, OCTOBER 31, 2021

MONDAY THROUGH SATURDAY FROM 10:00 A.M. to 8:00 P.M. & SUNDAY FROM 10:00 A.M. to 6:00 P.M.

If you do not vote early, then on Tuesday, November 2, 2021, you’ll vote at your normal polling place.

My wife Margie and I were the 2nd and 3rd voters at the Northfield, New Jersey early voting polling center.

First, the staff members were fantastic. They were enthusiastic and helpful.

It was fun because it was all new for everyone; the voters and the poll workers.

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We arrived at about 10:15 a.m., the polls were scheduled to open at 10:00 a.m.

About 10 minutes later, we watched the first voter walk out after casting his vote.

Margie and I, along with Atlantic County Commissioner Frank Balles and his wife, Cyndi Balles walked in next.

We we’re asked what our last names are and the poll workers were able to locate us in the voting records.

We next signed a hard copy of the voter registration authority, (the blue item) and signed a computer screen with a stylist (both are pictured below).

Next, you wait to be directed to a voting machine to actually cast your vote. That took a few more minutes.

The new voting process is outstanding. It’s not legal to publish your ballot in New Jersey, so I can’t show you what the ballot looks like here.

I can tell you that it is very well formulated and easy to follow.

The new voting process also shows you a printed paper  copy of your voted ballot, displayed behind glass.

You are given two chances to change your vote selections during the voting process.

ultimately, the digital display will advise that you can not change your vote after pressing this button.

Here’s exactly what this looks like:

The first screen displays your cast ballot.

The next screen instructs your to print your ballot. There is no turning back after you press the button to print your ballot.

This step looks exactly like this:

Lynn Caterson, one of the 4 Members of the Atlantic County Board of Elections was on hand in Northfield and appropriately perched outside of the voting area.

Maureen Bugdon, Superintendent of The Atlantic County Board of Elections was stationed at the Atlantic City polling center.

Full disclosure, I went into this new early voting method with a somewhat predisposed negative bias … which was not fair on my part.

Considering the fact that this is a brand new process, I left highly impressed with the overall experience.

The technology works. You cast your vote in the voting machine booth by touch screen. Use your finger to vote. The cylindrical item provided to vote, doesn’t work well.

That’s no one’s fault. It’s designed to be a human touch screen. Only COVID-19 brought about these plastic tubes, pictured here below:

I left the voting center more confident then ever before that my vote will count, because you actually get to see and review your printed ballot before finalizing your decisions.

I’m totally impressed with the new technology. Your voting machine ballot is able to be displayed in any of the six cities during early voting; just as though you were voting in your own home town polling place.

As impressed as I was with the new equipment abs voting processes; I was more impressed with the staff.

You could readily tell that they went through proper training to be able to implement early voting for the first time in New Jersey history.

Beyond that, even more impressive was how friendly, accommodating and service minded they were.

I was the second person ever in Northfield to cast an early vote and the whole process took less than 10 minutes.

I’m confident to say that going forward, you’ll be able to do it in less than a minute or two.

I give everyone involved a grade of A+

Below is a link of a previous story that I wrote recently about early voting … followed by additional galleries that will provide you with the location of every early voting center in New Jersey.

Read More: Early Voting In New Jersey For The First Time Ever Begins |