Board of Elections & Registration - Regular Meeting

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[Music] [Music] Good afternoon. The Camden County Board of Elections and Registrations regular board meeting is now called to order. We will begin our opening ceremonies with an invocation which will be delivered by vice chair Dr. Julia McCulla. You please stand. Before the invocation, would you please join me in a moment of silence for all families and victims impacted by recent violence, including those affected by the most recent tragedies. Thank you. Heavenly Father, empower each member to listen well, to choose dialogue over division, and to seek solutions that honor all constituents. May we serve selflessly, guided by humility, wisdom, and a desire for just and compassionate governance. In your name, we pray. Amen.

Amen. If you would please remain standing as we are led by our pledge of allegiance by Mr. Vernon Higgins. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. You may be seated.

Thank you. Before we move on to item B, you may have uh noticed that we have a new face with us today, and that would be Mr. Vernon Higgins, who is our new board member uh representing district 2. And Mr. Vernon, on behalf of the board, we would like to welcome you and just let you know that we're glad that you're here. Thank you. Thank you. Welcome. All right. Moving on to item B, which is a roll call. When I call your name, if you would please raise your hand and acknowledge that you're here. Robin Mayor Knight, chair, District 1, here. Mr. Mr. Vernon Higgins, member district 2, here.

Mr. Joseph Stale, member district three, here. Dr. Julia McCulla, vice chair, district 4, here. Mr. Ray Holland, member, district 5, present. All right. Please make note that all members are present. Thank you. All right. Has everyone had the opportunity to review the agenda? Yes. Yes.

All right. Are there any objections or requests to make any changes? All right, being there are no objections, the agenda is approved as presented. All right, moving on to item D, approval of minutes for July 18th, 2025 special call meeting. Has everyone had the chance to review our uh minutes? I have. Yes. All right. Are there any questions? No. All right. So, I need someone to uh make a motion, please. So, moved. Second. All right. It's been moved and second that the minutes be approved. All in favor, let be known by saying I. I. Are there any opposes?

No opposes. So, the minutes stand approved. All right. Moving on to item E, public comments. And this would be for agenda items only. If there are any comments from the public, if you would please come up now. Thank you. Please make sure that you state your name and the district that you reside in, please. Thank you.

Uh Mary Beckman, uh District Three, and I'd like to make a a comment and plea uh in relationship to the um uh uh item two under in new business. Uh I'm I know that our turnout was really really low in the uh uh PSC special primary and runoff. Uh but uh please um please don't take that as an indication that this is not an important election. It's a really important election and we need really need to get people to vote. uh and uh I hope that you will uh give them the opportunity to vote by uh having uh at least a few evenings of voting of early votings for people who work outside the county uh and uh h have to you know fly back from Jacksonville to to try to vote. Uh and if possible uh it, uh please have at least one day of early voting in uh Woodbine for uh people who live in the north end of the county. Thank you.

Good afternoon, Madame Chair and members of the board. My name is Terry Keller and I'm from Wood Haven in Kingston. That's District of Five. I think I'm here in a nonpartisan capacity committed as you are to fair, accessible elections for all Georgians. I hope you receive the election related emails I sent you a couple of days ago. This November, voters across Georgia, including here in Camden, will be voting for two statewide seats on the Public Service Commission. The PSC, as you know, regulates electricity and utilities, and their decisions directly affect our power bills. Normally, only one commissioner is up for election at a time, but because of legal delays, both seats are now on the ballot. As you also know, every voter in Georgia votes for all public service commission seats regardless of district. That is why it's essential for our citizens to get an expanded opportunity to let their voice be heard. For these important reasons, I'm respectfully asking the board to add at least two extra voting days prior to November 4th. More access means more participation, especially in important but often overlooked races such as this. It helps working families, seniors, and those who need flexibility to make their voices heard. Thank you for your time and commitment to fair elections. Thank you, Miss Appreciate that.

Good afternoon, Madame Chair and board. I'm Dr. Janet Bradford. I live in district 2 and I'd like to just reiterate the comments that have been made with regard to extended well I'd like extended voting hours and and of course um thank you for providing the um numbers for the public service commission. I think the majority of Camden County didn't even realize there was an election. So we have to do a better job of making people aware that there is an election and the importance of the decisions that are made by this particular commission. Um and but rather than asking rather than my asking for additional days, I would ask that you extend the hours and even if you have to cut a day. So instead of voting on Monday, maybe Tuesday through Friday, but extend the hours to 7:00 because for those people who do live outside of the count outside Yeah. Well, outside of the county, who work outside of the county, live in camp and work outside of the county, if you get off work at 5:00, you can't make it to the polls by 5:00. And if you already didn't know there was an election, by the time you find out and it's a public service commission, it's like, "Oh, well, what is that?" Well, now I'm I'm I'm not going to bother. So the importance of that particular election I think is additional incentive for you all to consider extending the hours even at the expense perhaps of losing a day so that people who do live who do work outside of the county will be allow will be able to vote uh in advance. So thank you for your time and

hopefully your consideration. Thank you Dr. reference. Are there any other public comments from the floor? All right, being there are none, we will move on to item F which is our financial report uh which will be coming from Miss Shannon Nettles for July August month end report. And Miss Nettles, if you would just after which move into um item G, please. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Good afternoon, board, and welcome aboard, Mr. Higgins. Thank you.

We're glad to have him on the board, but we that means we lose him as a pool manager in Waverly, which is um he'll be hard to replace. Um okay, so you're actually seeing just the ending August 31st budget obviously, which includes July. I don't have year end stuff yet from finance, but um are there any questions on the items that you saw listed in the financial report? We're under 10% of our budget in two months down. So there's no questions. Okay, no questions. I will I will move on. I should have put this. Let me see. We did that. Okay. This is the I don't know about y'all, but I can't even see that from here. So, it's much better in my book. Uh so, I'm going to skip ahead if there's no questions on finance. Okay. So, the elections office has been quite busy. Uh, we are glad to be here today to have our regular scheduled meeting where you can notice that we're missing Dennis. Dennis went to Savannah today for something called the blue ribbon committee group. Uh, there's a there's a lot of changes on the uh docket for next year. In 2026 will require us to transition into a new voting system. not the most ideal time and we don't have a plan just yet. The state does not. The blue ribbon group is trying to work with election officials to determine the best step forward in new election equipment, a new voting system. Um, specifically,

there's a law right now that that requires the removal of the QR code. And the removal of the QR code, you just can't get rid of it. uh you have to change your equipment if you don't utilize the QR code anymore like we have on our ballots currently. So we sent Dennis to be a voice for Camden and to kind of get an idea of what everything that they are speaking about. Okay, so that's where he is. He's on his way back right now, so you might see him before the end of the meeting. Let's see. Okay, Tuesday we were at Camden County High School for National Voter Registration Day. I had help with uh Mr. Vernon was there. Uh the vice chair Julia McCulla was there. We had uh we sit outside like the cafeteria when the when the students go to lunch. Uh we did have four different lunches that we try to encourage students to come over and register to vote. I will happily say that we received 50 voter registrations which is great turnout but our biggest question I think was what are we voting for? Um so we did educate them a little bit, talk to them about um elections and uh get them get their documents uh that we needed their telephone numbers, their names if they had their driver's license on them. We tr we do all paper registrations with the students because they're not supposed to have their cell phones with them um at lunch. So, but we did pretty good, I think, with 50 um and great help with with the board members. So, thank you both. It was fun, too. All right, LNA. So, obviously, we have an election in November. We have logic and accuracy testing that we had scheduled to start. I think initially it was Wednesday. We've been bumping it back and bumping it back because we we have to wait for our project to come in

from the Secretary of State's office and our ballot builders and we didn't have our project yet. We received our project yesterday. Um are not able to access that project until today. Uh tomorrow Dennis will get everything ready and prepared to begin logic and accuracy on Monday morning at 9:00. So that's the new final should be the last day that I'm going to change it. It'll be 9:00 a.m. Monday morning. So, everyone, the public's welcome. There's a note on the door. You all are, of course, welcome. And I I think some of you have been before to logic and accuracy. Yesterday, we were in the big city, the blueberry capital of Georgia. Do y'all know where that is?

Elma. Yeah. Bacon County. We were in Alma yesterday. The Bacon County agreed to host this for a region 14 meeting. Our um close nearby counties right here are all in region 14. It's where Charleton, uh Brantley, um US, Glenn, there's several of them. We had 11 counties represented yesterday because anybody else that's close gets to come to these meetings as well. and it gives election officials an opportunity to talk about our concerns and discuss different things that are going on in our in our areas at our county level. So, we had a great meeting went from about two 10 to two um a good lunch and there were 25 people in attendance. So, we were excited for a good day of fellowship and and uh and just kind of discussion, open discussion about elections in the state of Georgia. And lastly, what you'll see on the screen that I have for you, so I don't know if you're signed, you can go to the Georgia State Election Board online and you can sign up for notifications from the state election board. The state election board meets generally once a month. Um, this meeting in particular is for two days. The state election board has investigators that will review cases that are heard um from various counties. I could self-report someone or someone could file a complaint against us. It goes to the state election board. So you'll see they have here the county's name and they also have what the infraction was. Some of these cases go back a good long ways, but um I wanted to only point this out because I've already had a citizen contact me regarding why Camden County

was on the state election board because this ideally you don't ever want to see your name on here, right? Um, so I had a citizen reach out to me to find out why we have a Camden County photograph of ballot uh case that is on the docket for next week. And I'll explain to you all just to make sure as the board you're aware. Um, last year during the city council election in the city of St. Mary's, we had a candidate who had her name on the ballot. I don't know if y'all remember this. It was Miss Christine Adomau. Um, I spoke with her directly, but she did indeed take a photo of her ballot in the voting booth um, and then put it on social media. So, that's against the law. We obviously have signs and everything in place, but the the I had to self-report that because it, like I said, was all over social media. Um, and I my phone was ringing off the hook. You you just can't do that. Uh, so I self-reported it to the state election board. I'm sure they they have interviewed her. I sent them a whole case file on the situation, including photos and all all of that. So, that's what you'll see. Um, why Camden is on the on the docket. Okay. But it I I put this in your packet that I emailed to you also because if you look under the very first page, the blue link will get you into the meeting to listen. And it it's pretty interesting. It's it it's a little draggy. Uh and it is two two days. This one happens to be two days. They have a lot of cases to go over. Sometimes it's a hand slap, sometimes it's a fine, sometimes it's a we're sending this to the um attorney general's office to for them to deal with it. Um I don't I don't

know what'll happen here, but uh generally in the past if you've taken a photograph, you just got a hand slap. So um we'll see because it is something that's very serious. You're not allowed to do it. We preach no phones in the in the polling place. So um if you are are contacted by a citizen or a voter, this is what that's all about. Okay, Shannon, just in case anybody asked, um, will a decision be rendered that day or is it something that she'll be told later or will you receive the information?

Uh, it depends on what they do with her her case in particular. So, if she just gets a letter of reprimand, which is technically the name for the slap on the hand thing, um, you'll know right there listening to this event. you can see it live unfold. Um, so we'll know that day if that's happens, if that happens, but if it gets continued on to the AG or something. Uh, I've I've never had one go that far, so I don't know how you get that information or if they send it to you. But yes, any other questions? Let me make sure I covered all of my items. There's some other uh issues pending for the 2026 legislative session as well besides the transition to new voting systems. There's uh an appeal process for voterist challenges that's being looked into. Saturday voting that's being looked into. State election board. these these people. Um, this board makes rules uh and there's some information about that on the legislative session because they like have in the past made rules very close to an election. Um, and it's kind of messed us up and they haven't spoken with election officials before they've gone and made these rules. Um, and so that's why with the blue ribbon group, we're trying to become as an election whole of election officials in the state, trying to become a little more active with the legislators. Uh, and then lastly, they're looking at the definition of certification when we certify an election. So, there's some talk about some different things with that. Uh, but I think, Mr. Chair, that I that's all I had for my report.

Okay. See where we're at. Okay. Okay. So, new you can go on to new business. Yes, ma'am.

All right. So, we're going to item H, new business. And we have uh two items. The first one is discussion and or adoption of the proposed bylaw changes. Uh we had a work session uh where we kind of went over the bylaws and um are there any questions or does anybody have any discussion on the bylaws, suggestions? the point of order. Um, being new to the board, uh, having had a lot of time to, um, take in the new elections, uh, criteria that we'd be utilizing. I was wondering if there's a possibility that we could postpone that possibly to next month, to our next meeting.

Mr. Chair, I'd like to make a motion that uh we postpone the adoption until Mr. Vernon has a chance to review the uh bylaw changes in the existing bylaws. I'll second that. Okay. It has been motioned and second that we postpone the adoption of the proposed bylaw changes uh for further review. Um being that we do have a new board member giving him opportunity to review and uh have further discussion. Um all in favor I I

any opposes? No opposes. Okay. So um that part will be postponed. Please make note. All right. Moving on to item two. Uh the proposed advanced in-person voting schedule for the statewide special election. All right, for discussion. Um, do you all have anything that you like to say from the staff or from the office? Yes. Yes, chair. If we can have a couple of minutes. Rock and I have a few numbers to go over.

Sure. Um, so for advanced inerson voting for the November 4th election, staff usually sit down determine what we feel would be the best opportunities to provide voting uh to our our neighbors, to our voters here in the area. Uh, keeping in mind that we always utilize the annex location for early voting for three weeks and two Saturdays. uh this election uh has a holiday in it on the very first Monday of the of the voting early voting cycle. So that's why you'll see the dates I provided to you to start Tuesday, October 14th. Um the state law mandates um the number of days that we have to have early voting. Okay. To provide to the voters here in the county, we have to have three weeks and we have to have two Saturdays. And the two Saturdays have to be at least 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Uh we opted for this schedule of 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. based on the numbers of the voters that came in the last election that we held. uh actually not just the June the July runoff, but also the June primary and the July runoff. And as you remember, our turnout was considerably low. It wasn't most of the state except for uh maybe those larger counties that the PSC commissioners actually are over uh or they they represent specifically those districts even though they are for the whole state of Georgia. That's where the biggest turnout was. So, we kind of go through what our numbers are to determine one an opening and a closing time. Uh, and then how many locations we're going to have for early voting. Uh

Rock is going to go over some numbers with you all to showcase how many of the North End uh residents voted with us during early voting and uh or kind of like where where those voters came from that came to both Woodbine to vote and came to Kingsland at the annex to vote. Um, I think things would be a little different and we would have presented a different schedule had Woodbine's election not been cancelled and technically it has been cancelled. The two qualifiers during their qualification week were for sitting members that are already on the council. So, there is no need to have an election and it was it was cancelled for Woodbine. Of course, had Woodbine had an election, we would have our poll open uh here in in the in the in the government services complex. Okay. Uh we just feel like with the turnout from the previous election and what's expected in this turnout, we we're better serving our our voters in the annex. Uh because let's not forget, we also have absentee by mail that's available. Ballots, no excuse. Anybody can get one of those. They just have to request it. And those applications are open right now to complete and send in. Um we have early voting and this particular case I think it's 5 10 15 16 days of early voting. Uh and that includes the two Saturdays. uh as well as election day voting from 7:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. Uh so I'm going to let Rock go over a few of the numbers kind of like how we came to our determination on what was best to offer to the voters and give you just a little bit better

understanding of of who turned out to vote in the last election. and know that the schedules that we present are thought out by election. They are not like the norm. It's not always going to be the exact thing. We kind of just we don't feel like we best serve our voters that way. So really dependent on the the um not popularity of the election but how involved the community might be in it, how how much uh publication it's getting, advertising it's getting across the state. Uh then and what our turnout was in the past is how we go about determining this. So it is different for every election. Next year is going to be a big year midterms. Um, of course we'll have early voting in Woodbine next year uh for the May election. Uh, this is just the proposed schedule and I'll put it up here when Rock starts talking. This is the proposed schedule that staff decided on for this election.

It's at the very bottom sheet. Oh, it's one more. Yeah. Okay. Did you want to put this the schedule? Did you want to put the schedule up so they can follow along with me? Oh, yeah. They all have the Oh, my bad. Okay. Good afternoon, everyone.

Good afternoon. What you have here is a comparison of the morning and afternoon at both the annex and at Woodbine. The first hour in the morning and the last hour of the day. During the first week of advanced voting from 8:30 to 9:30, there was a total of 11 voters that first week. Five of those 11 were poll workers. We had no participation from voters from the north of the county. That afternoon there were 11 voters from four to five. Four of them were pole workers and no participation from the north. The second week there's a total of 21 voters from the in the first hour. Of that number, seven participated at the Woodbine location. Three of those seven were pole workers and all seven obviously were from the north end of the county. staying with the Woodbine. In the last hour, there were 14. Two of them were pole workers. Three on Wednesday, 11 on Thursday. Of that 11, they 10 of them were county employees. And the second week, the total number of voters were 21, eight of whom were pole workers. and seven were from the north part of the county. The last hour there were 29.

Two were pole workers, 14 were from the north, and again 10 of the 14 were county workers. The last week of early voting, there were eight in the first hour. Two were pole workers and one from the north. In the last hour there were 13 and we had no participation from the north the in the mornings. So that represented the north voters represented 20% of total voters for that early hour and 26.4 Four were represented in the last hour during advanced voting. Any questions from the board?

Mr. Rock, so is it Can you break that down? Did I'm sorry I might have missed it. Did you break that down as far as like how much foot traffic would be like per day or have you gotten to that yet? No, I have not gotten to that yet. Okay. I just want to ask if you would do that. So when you do get to that. Sure. Sure. Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. Any other questions?

Okay. The next item that I'm going through will be for advanced voting and we look at the precinct which is Woodbine. May not have that. Okay. For advanced voting, the total registered voters for the Woodbine precinct is 2015. We had 18 voters for the entire advanced voting period and on election day we had 34 which represented 2.8 voters coming through the doors per hour on election day. When you go to Tallbor Advanced Voting, there are nine and they have 1,51 registered voters. And on election day, of the 151 voters, 16 came out on election day, which represented 1.3 per hour. should be in the back and I apologize for that that you all are not having it. Okay. And with the the Waverly precinct for advanced voting, they have 1,875

registered voters. 17 participating in advanced voting. We have 47 on election day, which represents 3.9 or four per hour coming through the polling place. And in comparison for the July runoff, Woodbine for advanced voting had two participants. On election day, there were 21, which represented 1.75 voters per hour. Waverly 11 voters for advanced voting on election day there were 10 which represents 083 or less than one person per hour. Tarborough two participants for advanced voting election day one person which represents 08. So out of a 12-hour day they only worked a few minutes for that one person. And when we looked at these numbers, that's how we were able to determine that um in the best interests of all Camden County voters and the county commission, we would be best served to go with the hours that we proposed. Um, we also have advanced Oh, I'm sorry, FT by mail

applications. That's another option that voters have. And for this upcoming November election, the application started, we started accepting them on August the 18th. And as of today, we've only received 13 requests for absentee by mail ballot. So, did you say 13? 13. Yes, ma'am. Thank you.

Uh, we also I mean we also feel that we have we we give our voters plenty of opportunity to vote um over the course of those 16 days. um with two of those being on Saturdays. The opportunity for for absentee voting and for um election day is 7 am to 7 pm. Um, in addition, I provided you some information on Georgia and Florida uh employer what what what the employers of those working in Georgia and Florida have uh to do for their employees and and most of and while it's not always paid leave, but but you're supposed to get two hours of leave to be able to go and vote as well um without repercussions for leaving early. Granted, I know things happen. Um, but overall, our system is built to allow your employees to go out to vote, leave early to go make it to the poll before it closes. It's um it's very disheartening for us to sit in the poll all day with hardly anyone coming through. So, we do really try to figure out different ways to go about getting uh voters there. And it's really hard to see the the pole workers also just sitting there or reading a book or whatever they have to do to kind of occupy that. I mean, it we might not open until 8:30, but they're there at 7:30. We might not close till 5:30, but at 6:00 before they're out of there. Um, and it it's hard to sit there for hours like we did in the July runoff and not see any um any voters. And uh when I had the chance and I still had the proper coverage that the law required, I was

sending people home just to to try to save a little bit there and they were asking to go home because they were um they were bored to tears. So, um, we've provided also our pole workers some additional activities that they can participate in when there's absolutely nobody in the poll as well. But, um, we really appreciate the hard work that they do. We we understand the need to support all of the voters, um, in Camden County and what you all determined to be our our hours. Uh, of course, we'll run with that. So right now the schedule that staff have proposed is 8:30 to 5:30 Monday through Friday except for that holiday Monday 9 to5 on the two Saturdays October 18th and October 25th. Uh and then like I said applications are available now to begin filling out for absentee by mail ballots. So any questions?

I have a question.

Yes sir. What would be the probability? Currently, you're proposing 8:30 to 5:30. What would be the probability of taking that half hour in the morning and adding it to the evening? I'd rather see almost uh 90 minutes. Most voters are familiarized with the 7 to 7 U election day uh format. and an election such as this where it it's somewhat of surprising it appears to folks uh while we were at the high school a lot of young folks asked me there's an election this year yes there is for what was the response and and I would share with them that for the public service commission what is a public service commission so there's a lack of education as far as this uh special election that's uh going to take place this November but I do give thought to our voters since they and excuse this term naive I would say concerning this election and the um importance of the public service commission. One of the things that I have found out though when I ask folks um where do they receive their utilities from their electric bill and when they hear a response I said well public service commission regulates that body then I get uh a sense of the alertness and and their ears seem to want to hear what what you need to what I would impart to them about the public service commission and its responsibility as far as regulating utilities throughout the state of Georgia. So, having said all that, since our folks seem to be locked in to 7 to 7 on election day and those that come to

early voting at times will come know when I participated in early voting at the at the annex, folks would come uh as late as 5 or after 5 believing that the polls would still be open until 7. So, I think in there's any possibility that we could extend the the later hour if we could take it off of the front end, add it to the to the back end. And ideally, I'd like to see um and being a former uh poll manager and poll worker, as tedious as it is to remain viligent when there's no voters coming in, I do believe that if we extend those hours to allow folks that work outside the county to uh be here available to vote, uh that that would be a great possibility. may and it may not impact this election, but what we're doing is setting a pretent for for future elections by establishing a a standardized time that we hold accountable for all our elections, particularly our early voting. uh because once again we have folks with uh everyone's well aware of our voters for the most part that we are open 7 to 7 on election day. Everyone across America is pretty much uh in tune to that. So when we have these early voting hours and that change it I imagine obviously with the turnout that we receive that that impacts their psyche. Thank you. So,

Mr. Verie, your suggestion for clarity is to extend it to instead of 5:30 to 6. Is that what you're saying? Yes. And and not even open up until 9 to 6 because right now they're proposing 8:30 a.m. I propose 9:00 a.m. and and the 6 go to 6 pm and that's for the two Saturday. Is that No, no, no. I'm saying for for for during the week for early voting.

Okay. That's where we had really low turnout from 5 to 6:00. That's what happened last time. We had it set for either five or 5:30, I can't remember. And it ended up being voted on till 6:00. Those are the numbers that Rock went over, the ending numbers from 5 to 6. I mean, we were lucky if we saw somebody after about 517. um because they they weren't coming in. Not to say it won't happen this time. Um but I don't think that's where we're losing people if we are losing people. Do you follow me? I mean it's not in those last 30 minutes.

And for clarity just asking typically what has been the hours for early voting on any other election? What's what's the hours? Are they is it 8:30 to 5? Just trying to recollect. eight. I think 8 to 5 or 8 to 6. Like I said, I mean, it's it's very hard to say, okay, our polls are always going to be open from 7:30 a.m. until 6:00 p.m. because it it really it's really depends on the election. And if you have a a pole worker group, okay, now keep in mind, our pole workers don't work in shifts. they are there for the day. They cannot leave. Um and they are told that during during training if we start doing super long hours for during you know early voting hours um I mean maybe 9 to 6 but if we did like 7:30 to to 6 for a whole week that would make it extremely difficult for us to find pole workers that are going to be willing to give up that much time um to work and for us to schedule. And Leona can probably tell you this better than anyone because she does most of the scheduling for us. Uh that that would make it different difficult, but overall I want to say it's somewhere between 8 and 5:30, maybe 8 to 6. We I mean we've had a variety of hours, so there's not just one one set hours. I think when we did early voting in November, I don't know, they all run together. Um, and I I don't have I apologize. I don't have that data with me and I don't want to quote the incorrect time. Um, but

yeah, I just I just wanted to say it it does make it a little more difficult when you know to get staff pole workers to actually work at the polls if it's a really long day. Um, and then that last hour was pretty low numbers.

And also for that election, we also want to look at um pole worker safety. You know, we're going to be losing daylight and when no folks leave after a long day, we we want them to be safe. So, granted, we do want to provide opportunity for our voters. That's true. But we also have a responsibility to look out for our pole workers, most of whom are more mature, okay, and don't move as fast as they used to. So, we want to keep them safe. And also, there's the other option of the absentee ballot by mail. folks can still request them and they have until the 24th of October to get those ballots or those applications in to us and we can get them to ballot. Just real quick, did um we we changed the hours for the primary in June. Did you have any feedback from any Camden County voters that they were displeased with those hours and they could not make it?

I did not receive any. Not that I recall. No. And I don't remember hearing anything within the office. Thank you. Okay. Is there what are the ways that we advertise the absence absentee ballots and is there anything we can do um social media website pages anything extra that we can do to let folks know that that's an option too more than you've already doing? I mean it is it is on our website. It goes out in public notices that we put out for early voting. It's in the advertisement that we provide in the newspaper. in the newspaper and then in addition I'll generally put something in the uh Camden shopper as well because it goes to more homes.

So um you know there's no individualized mailing and we have a set group. We we even personally reached out to voters that had uh not that maybe we had absentee applications for for last year because you know you have to renew every every year and in this year because this is a special election. They have to request an absentee ballot for every election. So March was a separate one, June was a separate one, July is a separate one, November is a separate application. So, if you've got people that have are looking for their ballot and they didn't get it and they think because they already did an absentee ballot application, they had to request a new one. But we even made personal contacts with I don't remember do you remember how many people [Music]

we contact every person on that list and we receive every um application back. Can you repeat those numbers again, Miss Leon? Because 24 and those were 24 that filled out an application in March,

correct? and didn't realize they had to redo a new one for um for whatever June. Um because we didn't realize they were going to have to do a new one in June until we got confirmation from the Secretary of State's office that that had to be done. Um so, and that's only the people that we personally reached out to that had March applications. That doesn't count all of the people that called and said, "We haven't gotten our ballot yet." and we had to explain the process to um I mean I took somebody's application out to their house in the south side of St. Mary so that they they could get it filled out and get it turned in so they'd have a timely absentee ballot turned into them. I mean, so we are trying different ways to reach out to people, including some of the civic organizations and talking to them about the um the applications and the dates.

Mr. Stell, did you have a question? You started to speak, but you No, I I just wanted to confirm it was 24 that we had. Um, so do we need a motion to Can we Would you put those numbers back up? I mean, the times on the I think it's a page right before, please. Right there at the bottom. Excuse me. If you can see it, it's at the very bottom.

In In the meantime, excuse me. I'd like to say something. Miss Brenda, Miss Bren, is there any way that you can adjust the temperature? I'm trying to hold out, but I am about to freeze. I'm not sure if I'm the only one, but I am trembling at the moment. So, I've been bearing and trying so hard, but No, but it it it's freezing in here. Okay, that's fine. No, no, no. I'm good. Okay. Cold. Thank you.

Oh, yeah. So, right now we have 8:30 to 5:30 as our scheduled times. 9 to5 on um Saturdays, those two Saturdays. And then uh it does not reference a Woodbine uh early voting uh days. I last election we did two days in Woodbine. Okay.

But yes, I would like a motion and a vote on some some kind of time. All right. Before we before we move on, does anyone have any other comments? Any questions for the staff? Um any more suggestions? No, but I certainly appreciate the numbers and the and the presentation. It just, you know, I know the numbers were low in that and I I suspect it's going to be close to the same again this time. So, but thank you for Yes. letting us know that. I agree. Thank you for putting that together and making it where we could understand it. appreciate that. All right. Well,

I would like to make a motion that we adopt the uh hours as presented. I mean, based on history, the uh what what's been done, you know, and plus, you know, economic cost associated with it. Um I I move that we adopt as presented. A second. It has been motioned and second that we approve the proposed advanced in-person voting schedule for the statewide special election. All in favor, let it be known by and if you would please raise your hand. All in favor, let it be known by saying I. I.

I. Right. Any opposes. Nay. We have three, four, and one oppose. So, we'll go with the majority. So we will go with the proposed advance stands approved. Okay. Thank you board. I appreciate it.

So now we will go on to item I important upcoming dates and I'll read these and if you will follow along with me. State board election meeting Tuesday, September the 23rd, 2025 at 900 a.m. This will be held in Atlanta. All right. Number two, the pole worker training Tuesday, September 30th, 2025 um times 2 to 5:00 p.m. and Thursday, October 2nd, 2025, 9:00 a.m. till noon. And that will be held here in Woodbine. And you all are all invited to attend either session. Thank you. Both both of those are being held in Woodbine.

Both of them are held in Woodbine. Correct. Thank you. Yes. Oh, thank you for clarifying. Um advanced voting Tuesday, October 14th through Friday, October 31st, 2025 and Saturday, October 18th and the 25th at the Camden County Annex Building in Kingsland. And the times are 8:30 to 5:30 for the Tuesday through Friday and 9 to5 on the Saturdays. All right. The board of election and registration meeting will be held our next one will be on Thursday, October 16th, 2025, 400 pm uh same place here. All right, that ends all of our important dates. We'll move on to item J. Excuse me. Additional public comments. Oops. Once again, I'm Dr. Janet Bradford and I live in district two. Um, and the first thing I want to say is I certainly did not mean to imply that you should do anything that is contrary to the code. Dr. Beckman pointed that out to me. So you you can't skip days and I realize that uh advanced voting begins on Tuesday and but the other weeks it includes the Monday. So um and the but the really real reason I wanted to readress the board is to talk about this PSC election. First of all, it's an anomaly. It was extremely expensive and the numbers don't support the cost to the counties

and I am not by any stretch of the imagination a conspiracy theorist, but I would bet that Georgia Power wants this election to be held with very little input from the voters. voters because most people in the state of Georgia don't know that there is a public service commission. And so if you hold the election when people are going to the polls anyway, you would get a lot better turnout than than you do when you have this special election. So we're really addressing the symptom rather than the problem. The problem is people don't know a what the PSC is and b when there is an election. So I I would encourage the board to do what else you can to publicize the fact that yes there is an election and I would hope that we don't say well the person who represents Camden County isn't up for election. That is correct. It's a fivep person board. They vote as a board like the five of you. And in fact, the person who represents Camden County chairs the board. But the fact that he was not up for election should not be reason for Camden County to not be interested because when there is a an an issue for the board to vote on, everybody votes, not just the person who's uh are being elected for districts two and three. So somehow

we have to make Camden County aware that this board composition is important to you regardless of the fact that Mr. Shaw who represents Camden County among other counties was not up for um for election. So the the real issue is to work with the PSC and to get the election during a a regular election as opposed to a special election. uh when we look at the money that was spent on Dominion and now we're getting a new system and the cost to the county of holding these elections when you've got turnout of you know it it it it really is it it's indefensible to have to be paying people. First of all, pole workers aren't getting paid a whole lot of money anyway, but but it's their time. They don't do it for the money. It's it's got to be a commitment and and the time, but this is costing the counties and and so I would hope that at some point across the state, we would take up the cry, the human cry to make this election part of a re the the the normal election cycle rather than doing this in an in an off year. So, thank you very much.

Thank you, Dr. Bradford. We appreciate that. Are there any more public comments from the floor at this time?

If there's no more public comments before you close out, I just want to make sure you all understand there is a public service commissioner race that will be held in a normal election cycle next year. This one is completely out of how uh where it should be on the calendar, but I believe in May there's another PSC election. It I I believe that's the case. I know it's on the b it's on one of the ballots for 2026, but um this delayed election and the special that was held in June is all due to lawsuits that were filed u on the the two races that were running. I I'm not sure if it was just one of the races, but there were lawsuits that were filed and it went to court and then it went to another court. So, it has been delayed. Um, and that's why we're voting on it in an off year. Uh, it, believe me, there's a lot of election officials that um are not happy with the timing or the placement of this. But in addition, if you remember back in June, we did make a fact sheet. Um, and maybe there's a way we can better uh better spread that out to more maybe that's what needs to be in the paper is the fact sheet that kind of tells more like Dr. Bradford was speaking of what are we voting for? What do they do? It has all of that in there and it's also uh it will be on our website as well and it was back then in June and July so that people understood we directed many people to that page so that many people to that page so that they could better understand what the election was about. Um and so maybe there's another way we could promote that. So that's all I just wanted to add. This you'll see PSC again next year. Thank you, Miss Nettles. Are there any more?

Anyone else from the floor? Any board members, you have anything to say? Well, I just like to thank Miss Nettles and your staff for all your hard work and um everything that you do every day. As usual, we appreciate you and thank you for everything. All right, there's nothing else to be said, nothing else to be discussed. We're on to item K to adjourn our regular board meeting. Can I get a motion to adjurnn, please? Move to adjurnn. Second a motion and second to adjourn our meeting. All in favor be known by I. I. Any opposes? No opposing. Ajourn. Thank you everyone. Appreciate you. And I'm not going to yell out.