YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio (WKBN) – Last week was the first week of early voting in Ohio for the November general election.
Local voters said they like to vote early to get it out of the way and save time.
“Just to get it over with and get it out of the way. You know, I didn’t want to wait until the last minute and fight the crowd,” said voters Mike Maizel and Elaine Colon.
“I always try to come early because you never know what’s going to happen down the road on voting day,” voter Donna Smith said.
October 8 was the first day of early in-person voting and the polls were busy at first. Tom McCabe, the Director of the Mahoning County Board of Elections, says there’s typically a surge of voters at the start.
“We actually did more voters last week, over 4,000 voters in four days, than we did in the past two presidential elections,” McCabe said. “The first week is always the busiest then it tapers down in the second week and into the third week before it picks back up.”
McCabe says so far, they’ve been able to get voters in and out the door in under 10 minutes. That’s why some voters are casting their ballots ahead of time.