JEFFERSON PARISH, La. — An all hands-on deck situation -- that’s how the president of Jefferson Parish describes the effort to ensure all polling places will have electricity for Tuesday’s Presidential election.
Hurricane Zeta impacted an estimated 500 polling places in Southeast Louisiana. The pressure, stakes and scrutiny in the Presidential election are high enough, but Southeast Louisiana is now dealing with a challenge that no other region of the country is seeing: Restoring power to polling stations impacted by a hurricane.
“The disaster would’ve been to have people not being able to vote tomorrow,” Jefferson Parish President Cynthia Lee Sheng said.
Only a few local leaders can relate to what Lee Sheng is doing.
“We’re keeping our emergency operations center open through voting to be able to quickly respond to any of those needs,” said Lee Sheng at a press conference Monday.
Jefferson Parish started the day with 20 of its 143 polling sites lacking power. By three o’clock in the afternoon, that number was ten. Any site not fully powered by tomorrow will run on portable generators, which will come with a set of eyes on them.
“Any site that has generator power, I’ve assigned a firefighter to manage that generator and have a communication channel throughout the parish so that any site that starts off with electricity and maybe something happens during the day are able to quickly respond,” Lee Sheng said.
Jefferson parish fire officials say one of the so called “generator pods” will be able to fully power one polling location. Orleans Parish also prioritized getting power to its polls.
With just hours before the election, the Orleans Parish clerk of criminal court says of the 122 polling places in New Orleans, only three may have to run on generator power on election day.
“I feel good about the situation. Where you voted the last time, you went to the polls, go back,” said criminal court clerk Arthur Morrell.
Those are some easy to follow instructions after one of the most challenging run ups to an election. In Southeast Louisiana the phrase “power to the people” carries a lot of meaning in 2020.
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