Phawker reader Camille Escobedo wrote to tell us about an unpleasant experience she just had when she went to vote. About an hour ago, she says, she walked into her polling place in the All State Insurance office
at 1716 East Passyunk Avenue [Ward 39/Div. 45] and gave her name to the poll worker when asked. Hearing this, one of the other poll workers sitting behind the counter blurted out “Look, another spic!” Ms. Escobedo says she tried to defuse the situation by making a joke about it. “I told him we prefer to be called ‘Beaners’,” she says. “And then he was like, ‘No, it’s OK, I’m a spic too!'” That’s one word for it.
Escobedo says she filed a complaint with the Committee of 70 who sent a representative down to the polling place to investigate. Committee of 70 president Zachary Stahlberg says that barring the aforementioned alleged unpleasantness, there were few irregularities and nothing unusual reported today.
“Elections in Philly are never perfect,” Stahlberg told Phawker, “and as long as there are real people on both ends of this thing, there will be problems. But the biggest problem today was low turnout. I would be surprised if today’s turnout rises above 20% in the city.”