GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) — Over a million absentee ballots have already been sent out to voters across the state of Wisconsin, and local election clerks are dealing with the surge with more than a month to go until the November election.
“1.1 million absentee ballots out into the system, that represents almost a third of turnout we see in an election like the one coming up in November,” said Meagan Wolfe, Chief Election Officer of Wisconsin Election Commission.
More than 55,000 ballots have already been sent out in Brown County. Almost 8,000 have been returned.
Outagamie County has sent out more than 37,000 and has received about 3,000.
Wolfe said, “the election is well underway at this point.”
Which has been a new task for municipal clerks in charge of collecting these ballots. Deputy Clerk Elizabeth Miller says Grand Chute has already mailed 5,500 absentee ballots to voters.
Miller said, “usually our total absentee count is about that for a November election and that includes our in person voting. In our first huge batch that was a ton.”
To help keep up with the high demand WEC says clerks are using more resources than ever before, like absentee ballot drop boxes.
It’s a first for Grand Chute. Miller said, “we only have one drop box and we’ve never had one before.”
Cities are also hiring more poll workers.
“The more poll workers we have the more resources we have to process that volume, the more quickly polling places can get those unofficial results on election night,” said Wolfe.
Which is also the case for Grand Chute.
“We usually do have poll workers come in 2 weeks before election for early voting. we just have people that started this week,” said Miller, “1 to 2 people coming in each day just to help keep up.”
The Wisconsin Elections Commission says it typically only sees 200,000 completed ballots come through the mail.
Elections leaders say voters should request their absentee ballots, as soon as possible.
You can send those back in a USPS drop box — or hand deliver them to your municipal clerk’s office.
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