(Spirit Lake)– Early voting, both through the mail and in person, continues at a frantic pace. Jordan Moyer, who oversees elections at the Dickinson County Auditor’s Office says they’re also getting a lot of questions. She says they’ve been hearing quite a bit from people who voted by mail who forgot to put their ballot in a secrecy sleeve when they were getting ready to mail them back. Moyer says those ballots WILL still be counted…
“I actually had something that was an emergency election directive from the Legislature, from our Secretary of State’s Office that says if the board finds any ballot not enclosed in a secrecy envelope and the ballot is folded in such a way that any of the votes cast on the ballot are visible, the two special precinct election officials, one from each of the two political parties referred to in section 49.13 subsection two shall place the ballot in a secrecy envelope. No one shall examine the ballot except as provided in Iowa Code 53.23. So if we do get a ballot in the mail that’s in an envelope without a secrecy sleeve we will be the ones that put them in that secrecy sleeve and then those will get counted, put through our machine, on Monday. But the only thing that’s happening this Saturday is I have my absentee board coming in and opening up the ballots and just leaving them in their secrecy sleeves.”
Moyer reminds everyone that ballots being returned through the mail need to be postmarked by November 2nd and must received in county auditor’s offices by Noon November 9th in order to be counted. She recommends that if it’s at all possible, ballots either be returned in person to the Auditor’s Office or placed in the drop box, rather than mailing them at this point.
Moyer also reminds everyone polls will be open election day, November 3rd, from 7:00 am to 9:00 pm and that you must vote at your respective polling site. In the event you don’t know where your polling location is, Moyer says you can find that out by visiting the Secretary of State’s website.
