Covid infection doesn't halt Westmoreland County's Election Day preparations

Westmoreland County’s Elections Bureau office remained opened Monday after officials determined there was no widespread exposure to the coronavirus a day after an employee tested positive.

That diagnosis was just another obstacle ahead of Tuesday’s election as officials continue to work through challenges related to mail-in ballots and the pandemic during the final preparations for what county officials said could be a record voter turnout.

County commissioners said contact tracing determined no additional elections bureau staffers were required to quarantine as a result of the confirmed coronavirus diagnosis over the weekend. The infected employee was last at the courthouse Oct. 28 and stationed behind a plastic shield at the front counter of the Elections Bureau. No other employees have experienced any symptoms related to the virus, officials said.

“We don’t think this person came into close contact with anyone or had 15 minutes of exposure with other employees,” said Commissioner Doug Chew.

The county’s coronavirus policy has in the past required the closure of an office upon discovery of an employee who tested positive. With the pending election, the county opted to keep the elections bureau open and had maintenance intensively clean the office with a sanitizing fog.

Voters continued to stream into the courthouse Monday to receive reissued mail-in ballots to replace ones that had yet to arrive at their homes.

The county issued 76,228 mail-in ballots this fall. As of Monday morning, 57,338 ballots, or 75%, had been returned to the courthouse. The courthouse drop box for returned mail-in ballots was open until 8 p.m. Monday and is open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday.

The elections bureau also operated on emergency power Monday morning. An outage darkened the courthouse as the building opened and emergency generators were required to power operations in the elections bureau as other county offices remained in the dark until about 10 a.m.

“It’s 2020, and another case of ‘what can go wrong will go wrong,’ ” said Commissioner Sean Kertes about the power failure.

Public Works Director Greg McCloskey said it appeared the outage involved a transformer and underground equipment that is in need of replacement by the power company. The county is prepared to use emergency generators to keep the elections office operating on Tuesday, McCloskey said.

The courthouse experienced a two-hour power outage last week because of a downed tree near downtown Greensburg.

Meanwhile, final preparations for the counting of votes on Election Day continued.

The county set up machinery and scanners in the commissioners’ public meeting room, where two shifts of 40 workers were scheduled to start counting mail-in ballots when the polls open at 7 a.m. Tuesday.

Verification of the ballots will be done by elections bureau staff in a nearby office across the hall from the meeting room. Workers will open the outer envelops, remove ballots from the interior secrecy envelopes, and they will be inserted in four scanners for counting.

Officials said mail-in ballot results will be uploaded to the elections bureau website and posted when the first returns from the precincts are reported Tuesday night, probably around 9:30 p.m. Counting will continue through midnight, when a decision will be made to either continue or stop for the night.