No precinct chairs were present at St. Stephen’s Presbytarian Church on Tuesday but voting still went smoothly on Election Day.
Democratic chair for precinct 1105 Lawrence Carter decided to fill in for the missing precinct chairs at the polling place. Carter said that it was one of a chair’s civic responsibilities to be in attendance at their respective precinct’s polling place. As no one from precincts 1081 or 1095 had volunteered to show up from either party, Carter chose to come to St. Stephens to help supervise.
As defined by the Republican and Democratic parties of the state of Texas, precinct chairs are in charge of mobilizing voters and getting them to polls, representing their precinct on the County Executive Committee, fostering a connection between voters and elected officials and serving as a contact for their respective party in their area.
As residing precinct chair, Carter assigned duties to the poll workers present at the church and oversaw the general operations of the voting site along with communicating with the Tarrant County Elections Office.
Despite a slow trickle of voters, poll workers at St. Stephen’s declined to comment on the day’s activities.
Carter said there was quite a heavy turnout with a large rush of people crowding the voting site when the doors opened at 7 a.m. followed by a steady flow of voters throughout the day. There were no reported issues at the site with either the voters or the process.
Tarrant County voters from precincts 1081 and 1095 went to the church to cast their ballots in the 2012 race on either the one electronic voting machine or at one of the seven available booths in the space the church provided.
St. Stephens Presbyterian Church was one of seven places to vote in the 76109 area. The church is directly behind the TCU campus in the Frisco Heights neighborhood on McPherson Avenue and was the only site that was hosting two precincts in the 76109 other than McLean 6th Grade School.