Profiles in Election Administration: Maryland - Uplifting the Greatest Strengths and Unmet Needs of Maryland’s Local Election Officials Ahead of 2024
In recent years, the American election system has had to adapt to a rapidly changing security ecosystem, where threats to the integrity and access of our elections continue to evolve. This puts tremendous stress on state and local elections offices through challenges such as the aging equipment and facilities used to run our elections and the proportionately rising cost of servicing them; the avalanche of election administrators exiting the profession entirely; continued shortages in the number of poll workers available to staff numerous polling locations; evolving preferences for voting methods requiring multiple concurrent work streams for in-person and mail voting; and the increasingly sophisticated cybersecurity threats that election officials must monitor and counter.
State and local governments are investing in their systems of election administration in order to address these challenges but federal grants have been critical in helping state and local election offices overcome national headwinds like these in the past. Yet since the turn of the millennium, federal support has been sporadic and unpredictable. This has left many of these infrastructure challenges to fester and compound over time.
While Maryland, like every other state, is experiencing resource and capacity challenges, they are stepping up to the plate and taking bold action to address these challenges head-on. Facing severe poll worker shortages, Maryland’s General Assembly passed a bill using state funds to raise poll worker pay across the state and provide a special retention bonus for returning poll workers. With the state currently relying on e-PollBooks that have been in use since 2006, they are spending $9 million to replace these e-PollBooks with the latest and most secure technology. And in light of rising security threats and election warehouses that are bursting at the seams, local boards of election are expanding and hardening their facilities thanks to federal, state, and local sources of funding. Maryland deserves praise for their excellent use of limited resources and for the support they are giving to their local election officials. The hardworking boards of election and election directors throughout Maryland at the local level should similarly be recognized for their ingenuity and advocacy, and for doing so with limited federal support.
Building on prior research, this report seeks to shine a light on the amazing innovations and alarming needs that characterize Maryland’s election system. Based on interviews with election officials representing a diverse cross-section of the state’s election administration community, this report presents an unvarnished look at the state of elections in Maryland in order to accurately inform the general public and policymakers alike. The recommendations that follow are designed to provide both the State Board of Elections and the local boards of election with the support they need to administer safe, secure, modern, and accessible elections every season. Marylanders should be proud of the professional election administrators who serve them, and they deserve a fully resourced election system that can embody that same reputation.
The bottom line: additional federal dollars would go a long way toward helping extremely dedicated public servants at the state and local level continue to sustain and improve the systems that our democracy relies on. Every eligible voter should be able to rely on that same support – both in Maryland and across the country.
