Advocates work to protect nursing home vote during pandemic

As the leader of an outreach team with the Franklin County Board of Elections, Shirley Royer rolls her cart into county jails, nursing homes, psychiatric facilities and hospitals to make sure eligible voters get their chance to cast ballots.

"I'm the poll worker, and I'm here," Royer will say, reassuring the elderly and frail that she can assist with reading ballots, marking them properly and keeping them private and secure.

She and other elections officials across the state mask up and have continued to head out during the pandemic. But COVID-19 has complicated their field work.

"Never have we faced anything like this," Royer said. 

Advocates for seniors and people with disabilities worry that some voters could be missed if long-term care facilities, desperate to manage lethal risks from the coronavirus, fail to provide or permit voting assistance.

Senior communities that had long been polling sites cannot safely operate as voting locations this year. Many residents still can't come and go freely. And family members calling by phone sometimes find it difficult to ascertain whether a loved one has voted successfully.

"The secretary of state did instruct boards of elections to reach out," said Kevin Truitt, legal advocacy director at Disability Rights Ohio. "But what's happening at each of these facilities? That's one of our concerns."

Approaches might vary among Ohio's 88 counties, 1,000 or so registered nursing homes and approximately 800 assisted-living facilities. Though Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose issued a directive to boards on the voting rights of residents of long-term care facilities, a spokeswoman said the state is not tracking efforts.

Pete Van Runkle, executive director of the Ohio Health Care Association, said the organization has "clarified with members multiple times" that elections officials are to be allowed in no matter the visitation restrictions. 

Long-term care facilities also should know that employees are permitted to assist residents who ask for help with ballots, said Jen Miller, executive director of the League of Women Voters of Ohio.

"The law says that the voter can ask anyone to assist them," she said.

But Beverley Laubert, the state's long-term care ombudsman, said she's not sure all facilities have good awareness about voting procedures.

"We're hearing different things around the state," she said. "We want them to be actively helping residents, not being passive and having residents say, 'How can I vote?'"

To be sure, there are near-heroic efforts. Some nursing-home workers have been deputized as temporary elections workers in order to help residents vote without bringing outsiders to the facilities.

Others are working with county boards to arrange collection and return of absentee ballots, or to safely admit elections workers to assist.

There also are snags.

Catherine Snider, director of the Lawrence County Board of Elections in southern Ohio, said she is seeking guidance from the state on how to address voting at one local nursing home that says it doesn't have two staff members — rules call for one Republican and one Democrat — willing to be deputized and help with the vote. At the same time, Snider said, her own workers are 60 or older and don't want to go into the nursing home and risk contracting the virus.

"We'll get it worked out," she said Thursday.

Catherine LaCroix, co-president of the League of Women Voters of Greater Cleveland, said it's important for both residents and their family members to know of residents' right to vote.

Assisted- and independent-living communities, she and others said, don't necessarily get the same level of outreach as nursing homes. But many of those residents also have physical or cognitive impairments and face visitor restrictions.

"I know that where my mom is, they did not help with ballots," LaCroix said. "She knows who she wants to vote for, but the task of filling out the return envelope, the filling out of the information, that process is too difficult for her."

LaCroix had called the assisted-living facility to check on her 90-year-old mother's voting status but didn't get a reply. She then scheduled an outdoor visit so that she could help. "If I hadn't done that, she'd not be voting," LaCroix said.

Royer, 81, has been an elections worker in Franklin County for 16 years, a job she took up after retiring.

She doesn't fret too much about the virus, and she no longer feels a chill down her spine when doors slam behind her as she delivers ballots in jail. But the thrill of helping voters, sometimes against the odds, remains.

"I just want everyone to vote," Royer said as she worked at a Hilliard-area nursing home last week. "The older generation, they would go to the polls if they could."

To reach the Ohio long-term care ombudsman, call 1-800-282-1206. Disability Rights Ohio also provides voter information for people with disabilities before and on Election Day at 614-466-7264 or 800-282-9181.

 rprice@dispatch.com

@RitaPrice