NEW YORK CITY — The City Council deployed a team of staffers to monitor Tuesday's primary — hoping to avoid a repeat of April's presidential primary in which 120,000 voters arrived at polls to find they had been purged from the rolls.
“Voting is our most important civic duty and we must ensure the process works for all New Yorkers,” said City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito.
The council sent 27 staff members to visit districts where voter turnout is expected to be the highest, including Congressional District 7, which covers Chinatown, Cobble Hill, Red Hook, Carroll Gardens, Gowanus, Park Slope, Ridgewood, Bushwick and Woodhaven, where incumbent Rep. Nydia Velazquez is up for reelection.
They'll also were dispatched to Congressional District 13, which covers East Harlem, Harlem, Hamilton Heights, Washington Heights, Inwood, Kings Bridge, Bedford Park and Fordham Hill, where voters are looking to replace long-serving congressman Rep. Charles Rangel.
The monitors, who have been pulled from the legislative, policy and community engagement divisions of the council, will visit several polling sites and spend about half an hour at each site depending on level of activity, City Council Deputy Press Secretary Amy Varghese said.
Monitors will look for irregularities like voters who are denied, if a poll site has insufficient supplies and if voters must wait on a long line to vote, according to a release from the City Council.
The City Council has not yet said what the monitors have found Tuesday, but Community Board 4 in Brooklyn, Community Board 5 in Queens and Community Boards 9 and 10 in Manhattan all said they had so far not received complaints from constituents.
Last week, Velazquez called on the Justice Department to monitor polling sites in her district, which had a high number of voters purged on the April 19 primary.
The Department of Justice confirmed it received the request, but declined to comment further.
New York State Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman also has an election day hotline.
"My office is deeply committed to ensuring that all eligible voters have the ability to cast an effective ballot on Election Day,” Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said. “We will investigate and follow up on any complaints regarding any alleged improprieties at the voting booth.”
Voters can call 800-771-7755 or email civil.rights@ag.ny.gov between 6 a.m. and 9 p.m. today to report any irregularities they experience at the polls.
TODAY: We are operating an election hotline to troubleshoot any issues at the polls: https://t.co/4Q8a5yTwGK pic.twitter.com/wyLr9Ajzxi
— Eric Schneiderman (@AGSchneiderman) June 28, 2016
Primaries are not happening in every district in the city, including in neighborhoods like Cypress Hills and Sunset Park, which had some of the highest numbers of voters purged from the rolls in April.
Our poll site is so on point!! Everyone's here. Everything works! #NY13
— June Moses (@JuneMo41) June 28, 2016
