Senior housing, nursing homes no longer among McHenry County's polling places

McHenry County's polling places do not include nursing homes or senior living this election season, a McHenry County clerk's office official said.

The change was made to protect high-risk residents from being exposed to COVID-19 per the new guidelines from the Illinois Department of Public Health.

At least four nursing homes and senior housing facilities backed out of being polling places this past spring as the COVID-19 pandemic began to take hold in Illinois.

Another change this election season is that election judges will not be able to enter nursing homes to collect the votes of homebound or bedridden residents as is typically required by Illinois Election Code, chief deputy for the county clerk's office, Debra Nieto, said Monday.

"This election, we reached out to all of those facilities and, obviously, they either are not allowing any outside people in or they just don't want to take the risk of election judges coming into their facilities," Nieto said.

Instead, election staff will work with the activity directors of each of the county's state-certified nursing homes to deliver vote-by-mail ballots to all of the facility's homebound residents, she said.

Election judges will then arrange a time to pick up the completed ballots or the nursing home's staff can mail them in, depending on what works better for each facility, Nieto said.

In March, Valley Hi Nursing Home requested that it be removed as a polling place for the primary election to maintain the safety of its residents, she said. The clerk's office was able to quickly find an alternate location at the McHenry County Division of Transportation building across the street.

Since then, the clerk's office has relocated the other few precincts housed in similar facilities by moving them to a new location or combining them with other precincts that had room to accommodate more people, she said.

Precincts were relocated to nearby places such as libraries, churches or schools, Nieto said.

"We try to find some place that's close by that's either already being used as a polling place or is willing to allow us to use their facility," she said.

County clerk Joe Tirio said he is glad to report this particular recommendation from the Illinois Department of Public Health has not posed much of a challenge for the county as it continues to prepare for a safe and secure election come November.