My first Caucus

Tonight we experienced our first Caucus. I did not know what to expect. We pulled up to our district site, which happened to also be our usual polling site, Stonebrook Church. The parking lot was full, we pulled into a circle drive in the neighborhood across the street to park. We arrived at 6:35 and the line was along side the church well into the parking lot. We stood in line for about 10 minutes. Periodically someone would step outside and inform us which direction to move if we needed to register or where we needed to be based on our last name. When we got to the front of the line we checked in by initialing by our name and address on the registry. We found a seat inside the auditorium next to some neighbors of ours.

To start the caucus we were asked to stand and begin with saying the Pledge of Allegiance. What a flashback, I have not recited that in a group setting in probably 20 years. The next matter of business was to sign up to speak for your candidate if you wished to do so, the speakers were limited to two minutes. Next we nominated and approved a secretary and leader for our district. People spoke for their candidates. Everyone stuck to the time limit, so at this time only 15 minutes had elapsed since they officially started, which was a little late, 7:15.
The front row passed out our ballots, which were little slips of paper about 1/4 the size of a post it note. We wrote the last name of our candidate, folded and passed to the left. It took a few people about 20 minutes to count the vote. Many people left before the results were announced. While we waited they asked for 14 volunteers, 7 back-ups, and 7 Jr. delegates to attend the Story County delegation from our district. There was also time allowed for people to talk about amendments, one person had a petition to remove judge Hansen who this fall legislated from the bench on same sex marriage.

Huckabee had 126 votes in our district with Romney coming in second with 92. Apparently our district has the largest number of registered Republicans in Story County at 800, I counted 370 seats in the auditorium, with many standing in the back. Pretty good turnout and all in all a great first for me!