Voting by mail is safer - but how will this effect our polls?

It's no doubt that during todays rapidly growing pandemic, we need to be taking all measures possible to ensure the safety of our citizens globally. With the disruption COVID19 has already caused, we're already making changes to our public institutions, and many wonder how this will effect the voting turnout. While large gatherings are being cancelled, and institutions being put on hold, many still gather at voting polls. Standing in lines hundreds of people long, the voting turnout is proving to be a massive breach in community safety. 

Many say that voting in person needs to be put on hold while the virus is contained, and vote-by-mail is starting to sound like the future of casting ballots. This would allow citizens to cast their votes from a safe distance, but the problem is how little prepared many states are to transfer entirely to a mail in voting operation. If a state needs to abruptly transfer, it would require months to buy optical scanners, and months to retrain poll workers. This transition will require extra prep then many states are prepared for. Officials are saying "transitioning from voting in person to voting by mail would be a tectonic shift, presenting challenges that go beyond just technology or personnel, or even counting the vote." 

Printed ballots also causes an issue in terms of equality. Local governments often slack on translating the ballots to all necessary languages, and the laws regarding this are loose. Rural communities like North Dakota, Colorado, and Iowa pose yet another challenge, postage in these regions is slow and unreliable, creating an unfair disadvantage. 

While we wait to learn more about this pandemic, many fear voting by mail offers yet another tool for voter suppression. States now must plan to protect our electoral process from more disruption then already caused, and work to make voting easy and accessible to everyone.

Source: https://www.wctrib.com/opinion/4995818-David-Daley-Coronavirus-could-normalize-voting-by-mail.-That-will-create-other-problems.