From the seemingly unending stream of political brinksmanship emanating from Washington these days, you’d think the country has fallen into a state of partisan warfare. Refreshingly, our visit to Jefferson County’s Election Center this past week provided an encouraging outlook to the contrary.

In this office, dedicated Republicans and Democrats go to work, not to argue with each other, but to get the job done.

Jefferson County—home to the Louisville Cardinals, recently of Final Four fame—is the largest of Kentucky’s 120 counties, with a population of about 747,000 people. Roughly 67 percent of this population is registered to vote.

We were visiting at the invitation of County Clerk Bobbie Holsclaw.

Bobbie’s responsibilities cover the usual fare, as far as  local election officials go. She is charged with running elections, in addition to a host of other important administrative activities, including overseeing motor vehicles, county deeds, and marriage licenses. Her office is a revenue generator for the county; Kentucky law mandates that she is personally accountable for the fiscal health of the office.

Bobbie is a Republican, elected in a jurisdiction that runs about two-thirds Democratic. Jefferson County is a rare Democratic jurisdiction in a mostly Republican state. Kentucky has voted for Republican candidates in seven of the last ten presidential elections. In the 2012 election cycle, five out of Kentucky’s six congressional seats went to Republicans.

And yet, none of this seems to matter much in Bobbie’s office. “That stuff stays outside the job,” staff members told us repeatedly.

In all of our conversations with Election Center staffers–from the voter registration clerks, to the information services team, to the Center leadership—the emphasis was overwhelmingly on bipartisanship. “Bipartisan everything” the staffers called it.

When we sat down to watch how a clerk processes an absentee ballot, she made sure to wait until her counterpart of the opposite party was present. When visiting the “warehouse,” which houses voting equipment, elections materials, and the entirety of voter registration cards that have ever existed in Jefferson County,  guess who led the tour? Two kind co-managers: one Democrat and one Republican.

While the Election Center’s staff made clear that party affiliation has nothing to do with the substance of their work, their shared value for party-equality in every last operational detail was noteworthy. On more than one occasion, staffers informed us that this cultural emphasis came from Bobbie herself.

A balanced approach was central to the way they thought about doing their work—and it gave us pause for thought.

Beyond election offices, what other spaces exist in our country for explicit and regular bipartisan collaboration between everyday Americans?  How often do members of opposing political parties work intentionally on the gears of democracy, keeping their professional responsibilities above the fray of party allegiances?

Whether Jefferson County is the exception that proves the rule of partisan divide in the United States or indicative of a more bipartisan balance among local election offices remains an open question to us. But we can say with certainty that County Clerk Bobbie Holsclaw has set an example worth emulating, especially in Washington.