Election Day in New York City: Check Your Poll Site Tonight — It May Not Be Where You Voted Early
Polls open at 6 a.m. and close at 9 p.m. on Tuesday, anyone in line by 9 can vote, your Election Day site is assigned by your registered home address and can differ from your early voting site — and a mail ballot must be postmarked by Tuesday and received by November 11.
New York City votes on Tuesday, Nov. 3, and the Board of Elections' own guidance reduces the night before to a short list of things that actually go wrong. Poll sites are open from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. If you are in line by 9 p.m., you can stay in line to cast a ballot. And the single most common Election Day mistake is built into the system itself: your poll site is assigned by the home address registered with the Board of Elections, locations can change between elections, and your early voting poll site may be different from your Election Day site. The board's advice is blunt — always check your poll site before you go.
Inside the site, the routine is simple. A poll worker looks up your name on the list of registered voters or scans your Fast Pass — the card and tag the board mailed in the city's information mailer, not required but the fastest way through check-in. Only first-time voters who did not provide identification when they registered must show ID. You sign the poll book, mark a paper ballot in a privacy booth, and insert it into the scanner, which records the vote and is used to count all votes cast when polls close. Anyone who needs help marking a ballot can ask a poll worker for it.
Every poll site carries the machinery for voters with disabilities: Accessibility Clerks — ADA-focused poll workers who help on request — at least one Ballot Marking Device and one ADA Privacy Booth at every site, and aids such as magnifying sheets, so that every voter can mark and cast a ballot privately and independently. As required by the Voting Rights Act, the Board of Elections also provides interpretation services at certain poll sites; the board's Vote Phone Bank, at (866) 868-3692, can say whether your site is one of them.
Mail voters have their own two deadlines, and both are Tuesday-shaped. A mail or absentee ballot must be postmarked no later than Tuesday, Nov. 3, and received no later than November 11 to count — or it can be delivered in person by Election Day, to a borough Board of Elections office or an Election Day poll site. Voters who were issued a mail ballot and decide to vote in person instead vote on an affidavit ballot, as the board's earlier guidance set out.
On the ballot: the governorship, attorney general and comptroller, every congressional seat in the state, and the proposed ballot questions including the five City Charter amendments this desk explained on Sunday. The 690,526 New Yorkers who voted early have banked their say. Tuesday, from 6 a.m., belongs to everyone else — at the right poll site.
