People waiting hours for the first day of early voting

OTTAWA COUNTY, Mich. — Saturday marks the first day of early voting in Western Michigan, and at the Georgetown Charter Township office, lines were much longer than expected.

Between 7 a.m. and 3 p.m., at the Georgetown Charter Township office alone, 808 people showed up to cast their ballots.

“I thought maybe I would beat the crowd, but I ran into a really long line,” Michele Norton said.

On Saturday, Ottawa County’s four early voting locations totaled 2,761 votes; This nearly matches the overall early voting total for the August 6 primary election, which resulted in 2,862 votes.

“I’m happy that we have the option to do so and I felt compelled more than ever to get out and vote early,” Lisa Nash said.

Ottawa County Clerk Justin Roebuck said he didn’t expect such a large turnout.

“I think it’s really rewarding to be able to see that people want to participate at this level,” Roebuck said. “Our entire team has worked very hard, very diligently on the early voting process, and it’s great to see the turnout.” .”

Early voting is relatively new and is just beginning this year. According to Roebuck, there was about 1% turnout in early voting for the February primary and 2% turnout in the August state primary. However, to elect our new president, Roebuck said there was a constant line of early voters all day.

FOX 17

“Look at this result! We had a great first day of early voting. “We are just 101 voters away from surpassing our overall August turnout,” Roebuck shared on social media.

Ottawa County wasn’t the only West Michigan county that saw a large turnout.

FOX 17

“Today, 12,081 Kent County voters attended the first day of early voting in the November general election, nearly tripling in one day the number of voters who cast ballots during the entire nine-day early voting period in the primary election. August.” Kent County Clerk Lisa Posthumus Lyons said.

Posthumus added that she is impressed by how local employees handled attendance.

He explained that there was “a paper jam” with a tabulator at a location in the city of Grand Rapids.

“…which required the tabulator to be checked, so for a brief period, voters inserted their ballots into the secure auxiliary container,” Posthumus said. “This is not out of the ordinary and we never want these minor issues to delay the voting process and inconvenience voters, so our tabulators are equipped with these containers to allow them to continue casting their votes safely.”

The Kent County Clerk said only one election can access the auxiliary bin.

“After the tabulator is repaired, two election workers: a Republican and a Democrat place the ballots deposited in the auxiliary bin into the tabulator,” Posthumus said.

Muskegon County Clerk told FOX 17 that turnout in early voting on the first day was “simply amazing,” with 1,103 votes cast today. We were told more than 100 people were lining up before the doors opened on Saturday.

Early voting runs until November 3. You can find more information on how to find a polling place. here.

For additional information about early voting in your county, click here.

Follow FOX 17: Facebook – X (formerly Twitter) – instagram – YouTube