On election day, Shelby County's election office fields hundreds of phone calls from poll workers helping voters at more than 140 voting locations across the county. Before partnering with U.S. Digital Response (USDR), the office tracked those calls the same way it had for years: on a chalkboard, a dry-erase board, and sticky notes passed across the room.
With only 15 operators available to answer calls, this created bottlenecks, increased wait times, and made it difficult to gather critical timely information. The County needed a more efficient way to track key Election Day milestones across all their precincts.
Ron Boozer, the office's operations manager, and his colleagues Will Boyd and Stanita Gaddy, voting machine technicians, and Darlene Paul, the office's lead poll worker trainer, all work election day help desk shifts alongside about a dozen additional staff.
Before HelpLine, calls came in from poll workers, precincts, and technicians in the field, and staff wrote down who called, why, and whether the issue had been resolved, using whatever surface was closest.
"The problem we were having was everything was done on a chalkboard, a dry-erase board, sticky notes and just a lot of yelling across the room," Ron said.
That system made it hard to know, at any given moment, which issues were still open, who was handling them, and how long they had been waiting. With thousands of calls coming in over the course of a single election day, from poll workers reporting equipment problems to precincts confirming they had opened on time, keeping an accurate, reviewable record was nearly impossible. And the stakes were high: if a polling location wasn't open and ready to vote by 7 a.m., Ron said, news cameras could arrive before his team could resolve the issue.
Then, Shelby's election administrator, Linda Phillips, had seen USDR's tool at a conference and brought it back to the team.
Why HelpLine was the solution
Shelby's team found HelpLine straightforward to learn, with no unnecessary complexity standing between staff and the calls they needed to resolve. One feature in particular stood out early: a texting option that let poll workers report vote counts and check-ins directly, without tying up a phone line.
"Texting has helped eliminate [a lot from] the help desk," said Darlene. With 13 staff answering roughly 140 calls at once, she said, a text that populates a ticket immediately is far faster than a phone call, and it frees up the help desk to answer the technical questions that actually need a person on the line.
Thanks to HelpLine, Election Officers now know:
- The phone number from which they will receive text messages.
- The approximate times messages will be sent.
- Exactly what information they will be asked to provide.
Because officers are prepared, they can respond quickly by text, allowing them to collect critical Election Day information from all precincts in just minutes instead of relying on hundreds of phone calls.
The result is faster reporting, reduced Shelby’s Help Desk workload, real-time visibility into countywide operations, and more efficient deployment of resources when issues arise.
Most importantly, Help Desk operators remain available to assist precincts with actual Election Day problems instead of spending valuable time collecting routine status updates.
How Shelby County used HelpLine
Shelby's team first used HelpLine during the November 2024 presidential election, with training support from USDR. Since then, they've used it to track incoming calls, assign tickets to specific staff or teams, and confirm that every polling location has checked in and opened on time.
The tool has also changed how Shelby trains its poll workers and technicians. Will's team now uses HelpLine's data to identify recurring equipment issues, such as ballot-marking device issues, and has started teaching poll workers and deputies to handle simple fixes themselves, like resetting equipment, instead of always dispatching a technician. That, in turn, frees up the help desk to focus on calls that genuinely need expert attention.
Shelby's team has also directly shaped how the tool works. After the office asked for a way for technicians to get a text alert when a ticket was assigned to them, USDR added the feature to HelpLine.
During the County’s last election, at 7:00pm on Election Day the team realized that critical information coming in from our precincts via text wasn’t easily visible to our team.
“We contacted USDR and within minutes, they created the field we needed. The incoming texts immediately began populating into that field, giving us instant access to the information we had been missing. That kind of response is unheard of and very much appreciated.” Darlene reported.
Ron described a similar experience with USDR's support. "USDR has been a tremendous support," he said. "Anything we ask, the team tries to do it. They’ve always helped us."
The results
With HelpLine, Shelby's team can now search and pinpoint any ticket from election day within a few clicks, including when a call came in, who took it, and how long it took to resolve. That searchable record didn't exist before HelpLine, when the office's only record of a call was whatever fit on a sticky note.
The office is also starting to use HelpLine's data after election day to inform decisions for the next one. The team is looking at ticket trends by equipment type to guide training and maintenance between elections, and said the data will help make the office's case for more equipment.
Asked what he'd tell another election office considering HelpLine, Ron didn't hesitate: "It's not going to be as scary as they think. It's only going to help."
Try HelpLine in your election office
Shelby County is one of a growing number of election offices using USDR's Election Administration Platform to run election day operations, from poll worker management to help desk support. Learn more about USDR's Election Administration Platform and HelpLine Election Incident Manager, or get in touch to see how your office could put the same tools to work.
