University of West Florida Haas Center to study election process

“For quite some time, we have wanted to conduct a study to try to gauge voter attitudes and opinions in Escambia County,” said David Stafford, Escambia County supervisor of elections. “With higher voter participation in a presidential election year, this seemed like the perfect time to conduct this project.”

The study will assess the ease and efficiency of the voting process and the voters’ knowledge of voting options, locations and other general election information.

“The research will be starting up with a pilot study for the August primary and then larger data collection for the November general (election),” said Amy Newburn, assistant director of the Haas Center.

Data collection will consist of two parts, post-election phone surveys and early voting and election day intercept surveys. The analysis will continue through the end of the 2016 with the final findings released in 2017.

Participants will be asked questions such as, “How confident are you that your vote counted as intended, and how confident are you that all of the ballots in the county are counted as the voter(s) intended?”

“We are looking to see what voting method voters chose and why, where they get their election information, and how knowledgeable they feel the election workers are at the polling location or early-voting site,” Stafford said.

The project is funded jointly by the supervisor of elections and a grant from the UWF Center for Research and Economic Opportunity’s Northwest Florida Asset Valuation and Marketing Support Program.

For more information about the Haas Center, visit haas.uwf.edu.