Weeks after a majority of the Lebanon County Commissioners voted to eliminate the courthouse ballot drop box, Secretary of the Commonwealth Al Schmidt spoke about the use of drop boxes and need for more poll workers.
Schmidt said his department strongly encourages all county officials to use whatever resources are available to them to make sure eligible voters can request, receive and return their ballots.
“It’s really up to the county how they choose to do that,” he said. “The counties know their voters certainly better than the Department of State − or anyone in Harrisburg for that matter.”
While mail delivery times differ, Schmidt said it’s a real challenge for mail-in ballots to get to voter registration offices especially before the deadline in the last week of a general election or primary. It took 11 days for Schmidt’s mail-in ballot to reach the the Philadelphia County Voter Registration office in the 2020 primary.
“In my experience, drop boxes have been a valuable resource so that voters who receive their ballot at the last minute, or returning it in the last minute if it’s too late to mail it back, can return it to the board of elections and make sure it’s cast and counted,” he said.