Citizens of Hall County are coming out to the polls in record numbers to cast their ballot ahead of the Nov. 8 election.
At 8:45 a.m., Hall County reached the milestone of 10,000 early votes cast. As of 2 p.m., 11,000 votes have been cast with an average of about 1,650 votes per day with each day surpassing the last in terms of votes cast that day.
At this rate, the Hall County Board of Elections and Registrations expects Hall County to have 30,000 votes cast by the end of the early voting period, easily surpassing the 2012 early vote total of 23,882.
This would mean that one-third of Hall County’s 90,706 active voters will have cast an early ballot, which is great news for Charlotte Sosebee, Hall County Chief Registrar and Director of Elections.
“I really want as many people to vote early as we can get,” Sosebee said. “I want to have good numbers, and I want most everybody to vote early because everybody’s going to have a problem on Election Day. Dog’s going to die or something and they’re not going to be able to make it.
“Wife’s going to go into labor, something’s going to happen, but if they vote early, they have it out of the way.”
Early voting continues Monday-Friday 8 a.m.-5 p.m. this week and next on the lower level of the Hall County Government Building on Browns Bridge Road ending Nov. 4.
A special session will be held Saturday, Oct. 29 from 9 a.m.-4 p.m. at four locations (East Hall Community Center, North Hall Community Center, Spout Springs Library and the Hall County Government Building).
So far, 3,203 absentee ballots have been sent out with 1,770 already having been returned. In addition, 190 UOCAVA (Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act) ballots have been sent out.
As far as Election Day is concerned, the Board of Election and Registrations is expecting a number closer to the 2008 election with 78 percent of registered voters casting a ballot, opposed to the 70 percent that was tallied in 2012.
This will result in roughly 85,000 of the 108,606 registered voters in Hall County casting a ballot. Approximately 55,000 of them doing so on Election Day at the 31 polling places spread throughout the county. In preparation, all polling officials have received a minimum of five hours of training in advance of the election.
With such large numbers expected on Election Day, Sosebee strongly urges voters to vote early especially when early voting lines in Hall County have yet to exceed a max of 30 minutes.
“It’s just best when you already know who you are going to vote for to just go ahead and vote it.”
