Local Voters Asked for ID

"Hi, do you have ID today?" 

Judge of Elections Nancy Alonge poses the question to each and every voter at Hallowell Elementary School in Horsham. And, regardless of the answer, Alonge allows people to vote. 

"We're asking," Alonge told Patch of the Voter ID law, which has not yet gone into effect. "It's up to them whether they want to (provide identification)."

Out of 454 voters that passed through the polling place just before 2 p.m., Alonge estimated that about 5 percent refused to provide identification. 

"We have to let them vote as long as they're in our books," she said of what elections officials are billing as a practice round of sorts for the state's Voter ID law. 

Robert Hoeksema, who was passing out literature for Democratic candidates at the school Tuesday, said he was "upset about it."

"It's unnecessary," Hoeksema said. "The amount of voter fraud is infinitesimal."

Melody Marsden, the judge of elections at the Hatboro-Horsham High School polling place, said she, too, has been requesting ID.

"It makes it flow easier," Marsden said, adding that identification, when provided, is used to find the correct person on the list of registered voters. 

Like Alonge, Marsden said no one would be turned away. If voters do not wish to provide ID, Marsden said poll workers hand them an informational sheet outlining acceptable types of identification for subsequent elections. 

Horsham Township Republica Committeeman Mark McCouch said that "98 percent of the people had no issues" providing identification at the polls. 

"Everyone knows they're going to have to do it next year," McCouch said. 

In Hatboro, Judge of Elections Eric Zygmont said he's been asking voters coming to the polling place at Enterprise Fire Company to show ID.

Zygmont, a first-time judge of elections, said training provided by the Montgomery County Board of Elections directed him to ask everyone for identification because "they want people to be prepared and know."

Of the 540 voters that came through the fire department as of about 5:15 p.m. Tuesday, Zygmont said two or three voters gave poll workers a "significantly worse time than anybody else," but nothing that required intervention from the constable. 

Next year, voters who refuse to show identification will need to fill out a provisional ballot, Zygmont said. 

, said he does not have a general opposition to having people show identification to vote. However, he said it was "rushed into play" without adequate plans as to how people without ID could obtain identification.