In Wednesday’s Eagle, we learned that 90 residents of Butler County were inducted into Pennsylvania’s Voter Hall of Fame for voting in 50 years’ worth of general elections.

That covers 12 presidential elections and many more state, county and municipal elections. To vote in every one — without missing a single election — shows true dedication to the importance of the democratic process and a recognition of each person’s role in keeping our system going.

Among the 90 honored at the ceremony Tuesday, some had a particularly deep connection to the election process. One is Regis Young, who led the Butler County Election Bureau from 1988 to 2010, and another was Patricia Whitesell, a longtime poll worker who serves as an election judge in Butler Township.

Whitesell and Young both recalled the tremendous amount of work involved in making an election run smoothly. In addition to the tasks on Election Day, Young was responsible for training as many as 500 people for every election.

He reminisced about being anxious throughout the entire day before finally being able to breathe a sigh of relief when the polls closed and the votes were counted.

Elections and how they are run has become an increasingly polarized topic in our increasingly polarized world. Young and Whitesell serve as good antidotes to that.

Their service is a reminder that much of the work in every election — from checking in voters to tallying votes to canvassing the totals — is done by people who live and work in our communities, and who are doing the work because they believe in the importance of public participation in government.

It’s probably not a surprise, then, that several of the 90 new inductees to the Voter Hall of Fame were also poll workers. Congratulations to all of them — they are setting an example of dedication to their community we should all try to follow.

— JK