HAVERHILL – In a closet-sized room stacked with papers inside Haverhill City Hall, four workers stuff envelopes. It is monotonous work, but it is required every single election.
The paperwork has caused Haverhill City Clerk Kaitlin Wright and her staff of seven to work long hours and weekends well before election time to avoid getting buried by it.
“Other worldly, in a sense, the workload,” Wright said.
VOTES Act passed in 2020
It is because of the “VOTES Act” passed by the Massachusetts Legislature in 2020 which enacted universal vote by mail and automatic voter registration and Wright says it could be what is driving clerks out of the job.
As of January 2024, 42% of Massachusetts election administrators in 147 jurisdictions left their posts since 2020 according to the Bipartisan Policy Center. That is more than the national rate of 36%.
Filling in the gaps are new administrators like Wright who took over for Haverhill’s longtime clerk in 2023.