Pat McDonald has served as interim director since Jane Platten left the position last month to work for the county prosecutor. Platten is credited with turning around the once-troubled elections board, and McDonald says he will work to improve the systems and processes now in place.

One area of concern is poll worker training. McDonald says most of the county’s thousands of poll workers are on the job only one or two days a year. And, they only have a six-hour training session before each election. He says that is not enough time to keep the workers up to date on the constant changes in election law.

“What I envision is partnering with our community stakeholders to get more poll workers released from their jobs to attend quarterly training. And, I want to provide a website they can go on to get additional information throughout the year, not just prior to an election.”