Election board finishing voting preparations

WAPAKONETA — The Auglaize County Board of Elections is gearing up for the November general election and will be mailing absentee ballots soon.

So far, 15.6% of all county registered voters — about 5,000 people

— will be voting by mail before the deadline for absentee ballots. By comparison, in 2016, absentee voting totals included 6,122 ballots.

“We are just going to be very busy and doing the best job we can,” board of elections staff member Ada Cummins said.

Early voters have until the Monday before the election to submit those ballots, although Michelle Wilcox, director of the board, encourages voters to submit them as soon as possible — and to not try to “test the system” by submitting multiple ballots.

Absentee ballots will be sent to those who have requested them on Oct. 6.

Staff are reaching out to 40 people who have made a request for additional information; 30 of the applications received have missing information and 10 of the requests are from people who are not registered to vote. These requests for absentee ballots cannot be filled unless staff can receive answers to their questions.

Wilcox encouraged voters to read

all instructions for absentee ballots and to have a plan in the event they cannot vote in person at their precinct.

Even with the strong early interest in voting absentee, Wilcox still wants to use as many of the 252 poll workers who have signed up as she can. She said among those who signed up to work are students and attorneys who would qualify for continuing law education. The minimum needed to staff polling locations is 156 people.

“We are going to go ahead and use as many as we can, only because of the social distancing and the different jobs that they are going to have, like sanitizing,” Wilcox said.

Poll workers are mandated to wear masks.

“If they are interacting with voters, they have to wear a face shield as well. We didn’t buy plexiglass. It’s too expensive and would cost thousands and thousands of dollars,” Wilcox added.

For those planning to vote in person on Nov. 3, Wilcox is encouraging them to wear a mask.

“If somebody walks in without a mask we are going to say ‘I noticed you didn’t have a mask; here are masks, we have masks provided,’” Wilcox said. “If they don’t want to wear one, we are going to say ‘for the safety of our voters and our poll workers who are at that compromised age, we would ask that you vote curbside.’”