Shortly after joining King County Elections as webmaster, I set up a Twitter account for the department.

https://twitter.com/kcelections/status/155374078256091136

We began tweeting basic election information, but we had the account “up” when we had to close the office due to a weather emergency.

https://twitter.com/kcelections/status/157657092122083329

https://twitter.com/kcelections/status/159690672029450240

https://twitter.com/kcelections/status/160336777058594817

We began using the USA.gov URL shortener (via bit.ly) to for tracking, long before we had many followers. The .gov extension provides a legitimacy that other URL shorteners did not.

https://twitter.com/kcelections/status/162262119696441344

One of our key messages centered on helping King County residents register to vote. Another was to encourage voters to sign their envelopes. Notice we are using the hashtag #waelex which, four years later, is still an active hashtag for Washington state electoral politics.

https://twitter.com/kcelections/status/166570104627269632

https://twitter.com/kcelections/status/168118650098814976

https://twitter.com/kcelections/status/172777096727363584

Occasionally, we would retweet the Washington Secretary of State, the main King County account, or one of our cities. We were careful to avoid politics while encouraging civic participation and education.

https://twitter.com/kcelections/status/177512430287593473

https://twitter.com/secstatewa/status/179975622926401536