Voter Turnout ‘Presidential'-Like at Lindell, Poll Inspectors Say

* This story was updated at 8:05 p.m. on 11.5.13.

For some Long Beach residents at Lindell School on Election Day, it felt like 201, 2at least during the morning and early afternoon.

“I feel like it’s a presidential election because there are so many people coming in,” said Rosemary Sheridan, one of three inspectors working a table for registered voters from the West End.

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 Voters were turning out to cast ballots for six candidates running for City Council and two candidates for City Court judge, as well as those running in various other races, including county executive and district attorney.

Fellow inspector Kathleen McCarthy also compared the turnout to last year, when she worked in the same position at Lindell School during the presidential election. “It’s been quite a turnout,” she said. 

With the West School closed as a polling site in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, after one commissioner of the Nassau County Board of Elections disapproved of reopening the site, the site was relocated to Lindell School. But while the school housed two voting site, thereby making it a more active site, the inspectors said, the residents who turned out for each particular voting district appeared greater than usual.

McCarthy arrived at Lindell at 5:15 a.m. to help prepare the school gymnasium to open as a polling site 45 minutes later, and she anticipated she would leave well after polls closed at 9 p.m. Tuesday.

While McCarthy and Sheridan said that many West End residents who arrived to vote complained about the site relocation, one of the more common complaints the inspectors heard was the numerous robo calls residents received Tuesday from people on both sides of the political aisle asking them to for the candidates they support.

“A lot of them are saying that the constant calls are making them want to vote the other way,” said inspector Mel Borowka.

Rich Papetti, who has worked primarily as a poll watcher at West School’s voting site since 195, said of voter turnout at Lindell: “It’s just as busy, if not busier, than if we were at West School.”

Papetti speculated that the turnout, at least up until that point in early afternoon, may have a lot to do with residents who want to get out and vote after their experiences before and after Hurricane Sandy slammed the city and their homes last year.

“I don’t know if it’s that they’re determined to speak their minds or what,” he said.

Inspector Diane Parr said that her table, which assisted residents who lived between Lafayette and Magnolia boulevards and West Beech Street and West Park Avenue, was busier than when she worked at West School for Election Day 2011, the last year City Council elections were held.  

“It’s been very busy; really busy,” Parr said.

Her husband, Ken, served as a volunteer to help drive any West End residents in need of a ride to West School to vote at Lindell School throughout the morning. While he was unreachable by phone Tuesday afternoon, Parr said her husband told her the turnout to transport people was not great. “There wasn’t a huge number of people that he needed to drive,” she said.

An 88-year-old Ohio Street resident, who declined to reveal her name for this story, said she typically votes at West School but didn’t have a problem travelling to Lindell School on Tuesday.

“I was lucky enough to have a man drive me here today,” she said while waiting for a ride back home after voting. “I usually take cabs because I don’t go on the buses anymore.”

Lauryn Fischer, a 33-year-old Vermont Avenue resident, said she was still concerned about West End seniors who might not be able to make it to Lindell School to vote. She said the city bus that can drop people off and Lindell and West Park is still too much of a walk for some.   

“It wasn’t a problem for me, I’m young,” she said, “but it is for some seniors.”