There has been remarkable stability in the demographic makeup of the community of local election officials. When our survey results are compared to the results from surveys conducted by the Congressional Research Service in the 2000s, the profile of the typical LEO is mainly unchanged: a 50-year-old, white female, in an office with 3-5 staff, who is earning around $50,000 a year.
Be mindful, as in all things regarding local elections administration in the United States, that there is enormous variability between jurisdictions by size.
The percentage of non-female, non-white officials increases from small to medium to large jurisdictions. Less than half of the LEOs in the larger jurisdictions are female, for example, compared to 83% in the smaller jurisdictions. Not surprisingly, salaries are also substantially higher for an LEO in a larger jurisdiction, places where the “LEO” is more akin to a CEO, overseeing dozens to hundreds of employees and managing multimillion-dollar budgets.
