By Dawn De Busk

Staff Writer

NAPLES — Given national news reports about voting fraud, some local residents have become concerned about handing over the completed absentee ballots.

“The attitude of voting this year has been different from I have ever seen in any other year. People are very possessive with their ballots,” Naples Town Manager John Hawley said. 

Absentee ballot voting began last week in the Town of Naples. So, the staff has had a week to determine the pattern among some voters. 

People have marked their choices on the absentee ballot or brought from home a completed ballot, and then acted fearfully about handing it to the clerk, Hawley said. Some Naples voters have said they do not trust the ballots were going into a locked box, and perhaps the ballots were going to be shredded, he said.   

“People have accused us of shredding the ballots. They don’t want to hand back the absentee ballots,” he said. “There are people who firmly believe” that the ballots are being dumped in a dumpster out back or something along that nature.”  

“We are small town Naples,” he said, adding that the town hall staff is honorable and dedicated to an honest election process. 

Hawley updated the Naples Board of Selectmen on absentee ballot voting during the board’s meeting on Tuesday.

In late September, the town was still waiting on the state to mail off the absentee ballots. Then, the town received the absentee ballots at the beginning of October. So, people were able to come into the office and vote absentee — as long as they had not already requested an absentee ballot be mailed to them. 

By Oct. 6, last Tuesday, all of the absentee ballots had been mailed to residents who had requested one. 

“People didn’t have any patience. They were hearing that other communities had got absentee ballots and they wanted to know why they hadn’t got theirs yet,” Hawley said. “We have instances where two people in the same household requested absentee ballots but only one had arrived in the mail. We would show them that both ballots were mailed off on the same day. We explained it must be the postal service and not us. We have had a handful of those instances.”

It is important to note that if a person has requested an absentee ballot, that person cannot come into the office and ask for another absentee ballot. Anyone who has requested an absentee ballot has that written down next to their name on the registered voter list. That person cannot get a second absentee ballot. 

Hawley explained the difference between early voting and absentee voting.

Some communities in Maine opted to give residents the chance to vote early. Those communities have tally machines set up; and immediately after voting early, the ballot is counted. 

“Naples did not offer early voting. But people can still vote early,” Hawley said.“With early voting, they have a counting machine. And you run it right there. We don’t have the staff. We don’t have the machine.”

However, “if someone wants to vote early, they can request the absentee ballot at the front desk,” Hawley said. 

The ballots are then put in a locked box, and counted with others on election day. 

The attitude prior to Election Day 2020 has been unprecedented — filled with emotion and fear, the town manager said. 

The women at the front office “have taken a lot of verbal abuse this year. We are just anxious for Nov. 3 to come and go,” Hawley said.