Florida's USF has around 40, 000 students, only 3 voting booths.

[madfloridian]

Alex Sink, our Chief Financial Officer, and an Obama surrogate is there and calling on Election Supervisor Buddy Johnson to add some booths. The 40,000 may include surrounding campuses, but there should be more than 3 booths.

Students wait for 3 polling booths

At a student precinct for University of South Florida, the line is 2 hours long and growing. There are only three voting booths inside for two precincts voting. CFO Alex Sink is here as am Obama campaign surrogate: "This is ridiculous," she said. At a polling site for University of Florida on campus student voters, the line is 2 to 3 hours long and growing. There are only three voting booths inside for two precincts voting.

"I don't understand why there aren't more booths," said Ryan Russo, 18, who has already missed one class and has waited two hours. . "This is a college campus - a lot of people live here."

Poll deputy Opal Colvin said the number of booths was allocated to the site was based on past performance. "It used to be we'd get a trickle. This is a crush," she said. "Personally, I'm loving it."

Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink, visiting polling sites as an Obama surrogate, said: "This is ridiculous," she said. She is calling on Hillsborough Supervisor of Elections Buddy Johnson to ask him to bring more booths.

Good for Alex. She is the wife of former gubernatorial candidate Bill McBride, and is expected to run for governor someday.

The University of Central Florida in Orlando is not faring much better. I hope someone is there to speak up about it.

Three-hour wait at UCF arena

The voting line at the UCF arena has reached an estimated 3 hours in length.

How do college students deal with it? Like they always do, by ordering pizza.

That’s what Jessica and Rebecca Glass and her friends did after waiting an hour in line.

An hour later they were still nibbling on pizza and thinking about history.

“People say that our generation, that we are not going to vote, that we just don’t care,
said Rebecca Glass, 18, a freshman from Coral Springs. “We will surprise them," said Rachel Perry, 18, a freshman from Venice.

I still believe that in our country there should be a way to vote without having such long lines.

[GrizzlyMan]

1. It too bad, but they'll suck it up and wait

They will do their duty.

[ourbluenation]

2. STFIL

[madfloridian]

3. They should not have to.

Stand in such long lines, that is.

[madfloridian]

4. UCF gets reinforcements...shortens waits. Good for the Dem poll watchers.

http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/news_politics/2008/11/3-12-hour-wait.html

"The lines at the University of Central Florida arena exceeded 3 1/2 hours this afternoon and were still growing, leading the Democrats to complain and the Orange County Supervisor of Elections Office to send out reinforcements.

]Elections Supervisor Bill Cowles sent out four additional staff members, including a laptop operator to help speed the line, said spokeswoman Sultana Ali.

After reports that the UCF lines were approaching 5 hours, Democratic poll watchers said they had asked Cowles to add more staff and machines to the UCF arena.

In addition, Democrats were asking the supervisor to lengthen voting times at UCF to accommodate the longer waits. Florida polls close at 7 p.m. and people standing in line at that time may vote - as long as they were in line by 7 p.m.

Ali said she had not heard any reports of 5 hour lines, but had heard concerns from both county poll workers and partisan poll watchers. There was no immediate suggestion that the poll times would be extended. Ali said it should not matter."

[madfloridian]

5. Alex Sink, Democrat, got results...Buddy's sending more stuff.

http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2008/11/hillsborought-s.html

"After Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink intervened this afternoon, Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections Buddy Johnson agreed to ship more polling booths to the University of South Florida student center to relieve the long wait times. Students have been waiting in line for two to three hours since 5:30 a.m. there, poll workers said. The long lines are a result of higher than usual student turnout but exacerbated by the fact that the county supplied only three polling booths for two precincts to share.

"He said he's going to send more booths out there,'' Sink said after her phone call with Johnson. "But he said there's a space issue" and the university is going to have to expand the amount of space being used for student voting. Sink, a Democrat who has spent Tuesday working with the Obama campaign, said the Obama campaign will work with university officials to get the issue addressed quickly."