Angel Bolquez in his new role, teaching poll workers how to use new ballot boxes equipped with electronic tabulators on July 31 at the Julius E. Sprauve School.
CRUZ BAY – A few days before the 2014 primary election, Angel Bolquez took on a familiar role – teaching technology to a group of eager students.
But this time, Bolquez’s class was not filled with students from Gifft Hill School, as it was a few years ago. This time he appeared as an official from the St. Thomas-St. John Board of Elections.
Part of the job of the assistant administrator to the district board this year was to prepare voters and poll workers for use of new machines. To comply with the Help America Vote Act, the Election System of the Virgin Islands introduced voting machines designed to help the visually and hearing impaired.
Some new machines were also introduced to accommodate paper ballots. Paper balloting had always been around, in one form or another, but a higher number of average voters began expressing interest in using paper ballots instead of casting ballots by electronic voting machine.
“Each board has an administrative assistant. They have to keep atccounting for files and payments and also to move voting machines,” Bolques said. “It’s also runnning around and have the social awareness component, dealing with the machine.”
To deal with the machine, the former Gifft Hill School technology teacher turned to Election Systems and Software, a Nebraska based company that furnishes software to public officials conducting elections.
The recorded demonstrations and information links were more than useful, Bolques said, they gave Elections an affordable option to flying him to the U.S. mainland for training.
The company provided training videos which Bolques used to familiarize himself with the systems.
“I took the leap on my own. When I’m working on something, or trying to understand something I need to do research so I can explain to people about the pros and cons of the item or product,” he said.
Next came the demonstrations, about 50 carried out between April 28 and July 25. Those demonstrations took place in places as diverse as the Roy L. Schneider Hospital, the University of the Virgin Islands, local restaurants, and the headquarters of politicians competing for ballot space in the November General Election.
The result?
Relief, Bolques said.
“Some of them were saying, ‘This is a lot easier than I thought it was,’” Bolques said.