County election staff overcame brief power outage and phone outage workaround during election day processing

Election staff told the Buncombe County Board of Elections that a single polling site experienced a brief power outage; staff dispatched a generator and power was restored before personnel arrived. Election staff noted machines have battery backup and can operate for around two hours without external power, which kept voting uninterrupted at that site.

Separately, staff reported the internal call-center extension used by poll workers was not operating properly for several hours. Bria said staff worked with the county IT team and the phone-service vendor to provide a workaround — an alternate extension — and poll workers were able to call the main line and receive assistance. Board members emphasized the need to prioritize troubleshooting the vendor issue after the election so poll workers have reliable assistance at the start of future election days.

Board members and staff characterized both incidents as contained operational problems that were handled in the moment; they directed staff to follow up post-election on vendor performance and communication reliability.