BROOK PARK, Ohio — Voters in Brook Park lined up for hours to cast their ballots at the city’s recreation center Tuesday, as lines topped anything poll workers and long-time voters said they’d ever seen.
“I’ve always come here to vote, all the time,” said 99-year-old Lottie Vargo. “It’s the first time this has ever happened to me.”
Poll workers said voters were lined up at 6 a.m. before the polls opened. The line only grew longer as the day went on.
“It probably took two and a half hours,” said Guy Sylvester, “I’ve owned my house over 30 years here and it’s normally no more than 10 minutes.”
Cuyahoga County’s director of elections said the equipment was removed from some polling locations to ensure social distancing.
He said a large turnout for curbside voting for people unable to stand in line also forced workers to leave their posts and accommodate the cars lined up with people waiting to cast their ballots.
“We have been deploying additional electronic poll books into the field to some of the locations where we have some of the longer wait times with staff to try to work through those lines,” said Cuyahoga County Director of Elections Anthony Perlatti.
Perlatti said he’s expecting between 200,000 and 250,000 voters to cast in-person ballots Tuesday and said that matches the board of elections’s predictions.
For voters like Vargo, the chance to vote is worth the wait.
“I wouldn’t want to miss this voting at all,” she said.
