SAN ANTONIO — Four of the five most populous counties in Texas have a system that lets voters know approximate wait times at polling locations.
The one exception: Bexar County.
Bexar County Elections Administrator Jacque Callanen said Monday morning the she takes responsibility for the technology void.
"I will take responsibility because I want to say I have issues with it," Callanen said.
While the program appears to be utilized in other major counties without any apparent difficulties, Callanen said she fears it will cause backups at voting sites.
"Because if there are wait times and because so many people are voting, if they see they could go to Somerset because that was the lowest, tons of people are going to go to Somerset and by the time they get there, there's going to be a line," Callanen explained.
She said the best way to gauge which sites are more packed than others is to look at the numbers on the Bexar County elections page posted at the end of every day. But, because there is a varying number of voting machines at each location, the data doesn’t provide a clear picture.
KENS 5 has asked for the number of voting machines at each location on multiple occasions, but Callanen said Monday she has no intention to share that information.
She also declined to say whether the county has more voting machines in use now than in previous years as Texas sees an unprecedented voter turn out.
Though, Monday evening, a spokesperson for the Bexar County Elections Department said in total, there were 2,500 units for early & Election Day voting.
County Commissioner Justin Rodriguez told KENS 5 the live wait time feature was something he had unsuccessfully tried to implement ahead of the election.
"I mean, it seems pretty simple. You know, they do it at Six Flags and Disneyland," he said.
With early voting underway, Lily Casura is trying to fill the technological void using Facebook.
"I think what struck me was, (on) the first day of early voting, I saw a lot of people posting things on their pages," Casura said. "So they were like, 'How is the wait time at such and such?' And I thought that's really cool. But the only people (who) are going to see that are people on your friends' page."
After contemplating how to best execute her idea, Casura looked to a tried-and-true method that arose at the onset of the pandemic.
"There was an awesome (Facebook group) about grocery supplies during the first part of COVID," Casura explained. "And it helped a ton. And it was like, 'That thing worked. Just do it like that.'"
Casura started a Facebook group, inviting people who then invited others. Two days later, it had more than 2,000 members. By Monday, 5,00 people had joined. In fact, the fast-growing group caught the attention of Facebook itself, which soon prevented her from adding others.
"That's the heart of community," Casura said.
However, Casura added that she wished the idea came from a more official entity than herself.
"We clearly see there's a need," she said. "Sixteen-hundred people in 48 hours, when Facebook is blocking your ability to invite people shows there's a huge need for this. It's simple. Don't overdesign it, but get it done because people genuinely want to vote."