In a continued effort to modernize the elections process for the November 8th Presidential General Election, the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk will be leveraging geospatial technologies and Snapchat to improve elections operations and promote voter participation.

RR/CC is implementing a mobile app called Workforce for ArcGIS, from geospatial enterprise software corporation ESRI to make the process of troubleshooting work more efficiently.

During every election, troubleshooters are deployed throughout the County on Election Day to ensure polling places open and running smoothly. Dispatchers track the location of troubleshooters by calling them on a cell phone to determine their distance from polling places needing incident resolution.

“This mobile app will allow our department to track the real-time location of troubleshooters using an interactive web-based map,” said Jeramy Gray, Assistant Registrar-Recorder County Clerk, for Information Technology. “Each polling place and troubleshooter will be geotagged giving the dispatcher the ability to quickly dispatch the nearest troubleshooter to the polling place.”

Using the Workforce app, dispatchers will communicate assignments to troubleshooters through a smartphone. The troubleshooters can navigate to assigned polling places and report back to dispatchers on the status of assignments through the Workforce mobile app interface.

The department will also be promoting voter participation using a voter-centric geospatial feature called geofilters, available on social media app Snapchat.

The geofilter will be used to promote civic engagement, encourage voting and in the democratic process. Snapchat geofilters are graphical overlays that communicate the “where and when” of a Snap. RR/CC has designed a geofilter based on its 2016 voter outreach slogan Make Your Mark, and will be making the geofilter available at selected sites around the County.

“We hope that by using this geofilter, voters will find creative ways to celebrate their voting experience, and to encourage their friends, family and community to vote,” said Dean Logan, Registrar of Voters.

The mission of the Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk is to serve Los Angeles County by providing essential records management and election services in a fair, accessible and transparent manner. For more information, visit lavote.net and follow us on Twitter @LACountyRRCC.