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Today might seem eerily similar to Election Day four years ago with a fiercely fought presidential race going down to the wire. But there's a difference.

While Pennsylvanians will use the same patchwork of voting technology as the 2000 election -- paper ballots, punch cards, lever machines, optical-scan devices and electronic systems -- today's balloting will be more closely inspected for irregularities than any previous election.

"You are going to have all these attorneys involved," said Regis Young, director of elections in Butler County.

Legions of lawyers and partisan poll-watchers are descending on Pennsylvania and the Pittsburgh region today, concerned the swing state could turn into the debacle of Florida four years ago.

The polls open at 7 a.m. and close at 8 p.m.

In addition to the tight race between President Bush and Sen. John Kerry, voters also will be casting ballots for a U.S. Senate seat, U.S. House of Representatives terms, members of the General Assembly and state row offices, including treasurer, attorney general and auditor general.

Mark Wolosik, director of the Allegheny County elections office, said he expects voting to go smoothly. The most notable difference from the 2000 election will be that new federal and state laws require voters showing up for the first time in an election district to present proof of identification, Wolosik said.

The safest bet is to stick an acceptable form of identification in your pocket, whether you are certain or not you voted in the same location, he said.

"I'm going to bring mine," Wolosik added.

Another new feature in this election lets voters who run into registration problems at the polls cast provisional ballots right then instead of having to go to court. The validity of the ballot will be determined later.

"Hopefully, there won't be a lot of problems," said Celeste Taylor, Pittsburgh coordinator for the national Election Protection effort, "but there will be because of what's at stake."

Local voters -- particularly those in Pittsburgh neighborhoods such as Oakland and the Hill District -- can expect a phalanx of people at their polling precincts. Both major parties registered monitors to watch the voting and nonpartisan groups are placing hundreds of law students outside to help resolve disputes.

Organizers say their goal is to prevent a repeat of the 2000 presidential election, when problems in Florida put the outcome of the election in doubt for more than a month. Others fear the presence of so many observers could cause problems of its own.

"I have a feeling that what it might create is more challenges," said Monna Accurti, Pennsylvania's elections commissioner.

Tom Flaherty, chairman of the Allegheny County Democratic Committee, said voters probably will see another difference this year: lines at the polls due to heavy turnout.

"This will be a climactic day," he said. "I think a lot of the intensity we will experience at the polls had its beginning in that five-week period of being in limbo after the 2000 election."

Monica Douglas, chairwoman of the county's Young Republicans organization, also expects a higher-than-normal turnout.

"There has been so much emphasis on this election, even as opposed to four years ago," she said. "Both sides have really organized their volunteers and supporters to the extent that I've never seen happen before."

Wolosik predicts 80 percent of the Allegheny County's 921,008 registered voters will cast ballots.

A nonpartisan umbrella group, Election Protection, hopes to have about 300 volunteers stationed in shifts outside 60 polling precincts in minority, low-income and college student polling places around Pittsburgh and Wilkinsburg, Taylor said. Identified by their T-shirts, they will stand in pairs outside the polling places to help anyone denied the right to vote.

A group of lawyers will be on call in a command center at the Downtown law firm of Eckert Seamans Cherin & Mellott, said Mark Willard, a partner with the firm. They will be ready to travel to places where disputes arise, he said.

Still more lawyers will be stationed at the City-County Building, Downtown, where a county judge will available to hear elections challenges.

The lawyers will be on the lookout for problems resulting from mistakes in voter registration lists, confusing ballots and ballot instructions, malfunctioning voting machines and improper purging of validly registered voters. They will be paying particular attention to new rules in the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002.

"This isn't rocket science," Willard said. "The law just needs to be applied in the right way."

The nonpartisan observers said they fear Republican and Democratic poll monitors will try to prevent people from voting. The parties and candidates have registered monitors to stand inside polling precincts to ensure only valid voters enter the booths.

New voters are expected to face the most challenges to voting.

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now signed up more than 24,000 new voters in Allegheny County's low- and middle-income communities, said Mary Ellen Hayden, a coordinator. With 500 volunteers and paid employees, ACORN hopes to knock on 47,000 doors today to remind people to vote.

Anyone seeking information about voting can contact Election Protection's hotline at 1-866-OUR-VOTE.

"I don't think it will be mayhem, but it will be one of the more unique elections in modern history," said Jerry Shuster, a political communications professor at the University of Pittsburgh and Robert Morris University. "(Voters) are going to see a cadre of people the likes of which they have never seen before."

Each party and candidate can have one person at a time inside the polling places, watching the voting process, Wolosik said. All others must be at least 10 feet away from the entrance to the polling place.

Common Pleas Court, Pittsburgh city offices and most county row offices are closed. The county administrative offices will be open. State liquor stores are closed. Federal and state offices are open.

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