Using county employees and volunteers from local businesses to help staff polling places is one of several ideas approved Monday by a panel appointed by the governor to help reform the state's election system.

The panel, which was created by Gov. Jeb Bush in response to problems that marred the 2000 presidential election and the state primary for governor in September, made the suggestion as a way to combat concerns that incompetence by some poll workers resulted in some snafus that left the primary in limbo for a week.

"We're in a new era," Secretary of State Jim Smith said, co-chairman of the 2002 Select Task Force on Election Procedures, Standards and Technology. "We need a much better trained, high tech-oriented person to be a poll worker."

During its daylong meeting at the Orlando International Airport, the 15-member panel also endorsed: encouraging early voting; discarding the primary run-off for another election cycle; and establishing a statewide voter registration system. The panel's recommendations will be presented to Gov. Bush and legislative leaders by Dec. 30. The Legislature will take action on the advice during the 2003 session.

After the debacle of the 2000 presidential election, many counties turned in their obsolete voting equipment for new touchscreen technology. But during the 2002 primary, volunteer poll workers - many of them retirees - were confused by the new machines, causing massive delays and, occasionally, lost votes.

Several ideas were batted around by the panel to help address that problem, such as encouraging businesses to offer volunteers or to allow attorneys to count the time spent volunteering at the polls as part of their pro bono work.

County workers supplemented the usual volunteers during the recent elections. Miami-Dade placed three workers at each of its 553 polling places, while Palm Beach sent out 600 workers to assist the 4,600 volunteers already in place.

But the suggestion of using college and high school students was met with winces by two elections supervisors. Palm Beach County's Theresa LePore and St. John's County's Penny Halyburton said youths who wanted to volunteer were aghast at the early hour at which poll workers begin their day.

"When you mention 6 a.m., you never hear from them again," Halyburton said.

Making early voting easier was encouraged by the panel, with a recommendation to eliminate the requirement for a witness on absentee ballots.

State Sen. Ron Klein, D-Delray Beach, also successfully lobbied to suggest elections supervisors devise minimum standards for early voting. He noted that in his senate district, the rules for casting absentee ballots varied from Broward County to Palm Beach County.

Run-off primaries appeared to be headed to "a slow death," Smith said after a vote passed that would recommend holding another election cycle without them.

The 2002 election was the first in many years that didn't provide for a second primary if a candidate didn't get at least 50 percent of the vote. The Legislature temporarily suspended run-off primaries last year, until 2004.

Pasco County Supervisor of Elections Kurt Browning pointed out that 2000's second primary election drew only 12 percent of registered voters, as opposed to 25 percent for the first primary and 70 percent for the general election.

Browning also noted that run-offs aren't used for general elections, although third parties sometimes hold winners below 50 percent. "If you can be elected without the majority of votes cast, why do we need to carry that back so you have to be nominated with the majority of votes cast?" he asked.

But Reps. Lindsay Harrington, R-Punta Gorda, and Nan Rich, D-Weston, both expressed concern that a party's nominee might've won despite carrying just a thin fraction of the vote

Also, Sen. Lee Constantine, R-Altamonte Springs, said he would be a hypocrite if he didn't vote against eliminating the run-off; in 1992, he finished second in primary for a House seat but won the run-off and later was elected to the office.

Constantine later changed his vote, helping approve the amendment that would delay a decision on run-offs rather than dumping them altogether.

Bush appointed the task force on Nov. 18, and gave it the responsibility of evaluating the election reforms enacted in the wake of the 2000 debacle. Those reforms were proposed by a similar panel in early 2001.

"A lot of things the feds are now requiring, we have been implementing the past two years," said Clay Roberts, general counsel to the Florida Department of State.