Someone will watch over elections in each precinct on Election Day to ensure all those who are eligible to cast a vote can do so.

Both the Butler County Republican and Democratic committees will send poll watchers to some or all of the county's 89 voting precincts at next week's general election.

The poll watchers, not to be confused with the paid poll workers at each precinct, are trained volunteers working for the two political parties in the county.

Poll watchers, according to the Pennsylvania Department of State website, must be qualified voters in the county.

As poll watchers, they have the right to:

- Keep a list of voters

- Challenge the qualifications of voters

- Inspect the voting check list and either of the two numbered lists of voters when voters are not present in the polling place, but may not mark or alter any official records. Each precinct's judge of elections must personally supervise or delegate a supervisor for inspection of the lists.

Poll watchers are not to intimidate or harass voters or elections bureau officials, the website states.

The Butler County Republican Committee will have poll watchers at most or all of the county's 89 precincts, said Trish Lindsay, the committee's internal vice chairwoman.

She stressed that the poll watchers are being deployed not to challenge voters' eligibility to vote, but to prevent any confusion associated with the first presidential election under the new system in which anyone can vote by mail-in ballot.

Lindsay wants to ensure all voters whose names are marked as a mail-in voter are given a provisional ballot if they wish to vote at the precinct.

Also, those who bring their properly sealed and signed mail-in ballots can surrender them to the precinct's judge of elections and vote at the polls, which the poll watchers will ensure is carried out, Lindsay said.

“Our poll watchers will make sure people know what they can and cannot do,” she said.

Lindsay said the poll watchers' main job will be to see that no one who is duly eligible to vote will be turned away from their precinct on Election Day.

“It's not that people are doing anything dishonest,” Lindsay said. “It's so there is an accurate count and no one loses their vote.”

She said the county Bureau of Elections allows one poll watcher certificate per precinct, and voters at all precincts but the smallest will see a poll watcher from the county Republican Committee at their polling place.

“We just want to have an accurate count,” Lindsay said.

Catherine Lalonde, chairwoman of the Butler County Democratic Committee, said the 50-plus poll watchers she has organized is a higher count than in normal elections because the 2020 race for president has been so contentious.

She said poll watchers will be dealing mainly with each precinct's judge of elections and not approaching or confronting voters.

The poll watchers, Lalonde said, also are meant to ensure voters who have been challenged have someone to turn to if they feel they are being wrongly prevented from voting.

“They are there to safeguard that people who should be voting do and people who shouldn't be voting don't,” she said.

Lalonde said extra poll watchers were added last year in precincts within the Mars Area School District.

“In 2019, the Mars School Board race was pretty heated,” she said, “so we had people there.”

She said poll watchers complete an online training course, so they know their role and what to watch for at the polls.