Will County holds first central count, with roughly 25,000 mail-in ballots
The Will County clerk’s office held its first central count over the weekend, feeding about 25,000 mailin ballots into tabulators.
Election judges worked Saturday and Sunday, opening vote-by-mail envelopes and feeding the ballots into tabulators. The clerk’s office will conduct central counts each of the next three weekends before the election.
Though ballots were processed, votes will not be counted until Election Day. The clerk’s office will use the same tabulating machines for each central count and the information from those machines will be downloaded on Nov. 3. Tabulators are stored in secure locations.
Will County has mailed out 116,922 mail-in ballots requested by residents. As of Monday, just more than 42,000 of those ballots had been filled out and returned.
More than 5,300 residents also had cast their ballot in person as of Monday through early voting at the clerk’s office in Joliet, said Charles Pelkie, chief of staff for Clerk Lauren Staley-Ferry. Roughly 20% to 25% of those using early voting had surrendered their mail-in ballot to vote in person instead, Pelkie said.
About 50 election judges were on hand Saturday and Sunday for the first central count formailin ballots. Judges worked in groups of two opening and verifying ballots while employees fromthe clerk’s office took in bins of ballots to feed into the tabulators.
Staley-Ferry said the count went well and that workers were able to open more than 12,000 envelopes in about an hour, thanks to new machines purchased for the election.
“Everything went very smoothly,” she said.
Staley-Ferry said her office is still receiving mailin ballot applications and that the office is receiving roughly 2,000 completed ballots a day through the U.S. Postal Service and secure drop boxes located throughout the county.
Voters this week can continue to vote early at the clerk’s office in Joliet. Beginning Oct. 19, early voting will open at select locations across the county. Locations and hours for those polling places is available at www.thewillcountyclerk.com.