SNOHOMISH COUNTY, OCT. 23: Your ballot has arrived in the mail. Your voter’s pamphlet arrived a few weeks ago. It is time to vote in the general election. Election Day itself is Tuesday, November 5. Snohomish County mailed out over 500,000 ballots to registered voters last week that should have arrived in your mailbox.
But why wait until Election Day to vote? Voting now helps ensure your vote is counted as a part of Election Night results.
Your Ballot
Here are some key details about your ballot. First, it has two sides with contests involving federal, state, and local candidates as well as four statewide initiatives. Be sure to place your votes on both sides.
Second, use a black or blue pen, NOT a pencil, nor another kind of pen. Fill in the bubble for each vote choice as opposed to an “X” or other mark. Finally, be sure to tear off the stub at the top of the ballot to ensure the ballot fits within the envelope you received.
Once you have completed filling out your ballot, place your ballot within the secrecy sleeve. The sleeve is purposely a bit smaller than the ballot so election staff processing your ballot can easily remove the ballot and prepare it for tabulation.
And critically important is signing your ballot return envelope. The signature is compared with your voting registration signature as a part of the ballot processing effort.
Returning Your Ballot
There are two options to return your ballot. The enclosed ballot mailing envelope can be mailed. No stamp is needed. Just simply place the envelope in the mail. It must be postmarked by Election Day November 5, so be sure to get into the mail sooner than later.
The other option is dropping your ballot into a drop box. Snohomish County has 35 drop boxes located throughout the county. Skagit County has 13, and Island County has 7 drop boxes. To learn where the drop boxes are located, visit your local elections office website. Ballots also must be dropped off by 8 p.m. on Election Night.
But why wait? Get your ballot in as soon as possible.
Election Office Processing
You can visit your local elections office and see how ballots are processed in person. There is unfortunately a lot of misinformation about how ballots are handled. Election office staff provide tours and explain how each ballot is processed, and votes are tabulated in a safe and secure manner. See it for yourself!
Snohomish County opened its new elections office at the County Administration Building in downtown Everett earlier this year. Clear walls and TV monitors permit visitors to see each step in ballot processing. Staff can provide answers to all your questions as you walk through the facility.
Here is a short rundown of how your ballot is processed. Your ballot arrives either via the mail or from drop boxes collected each day. The external envelopes are scanned gathering the signatures for each voter that are identified by a bar code singular to each registered voter.
The next step is signature verification. Washington State Patrol trained staff to compare the returned ballot signature with the voter registration signature. During your tour, you can literally see this comparison effort in person. Only a small fraction of less than 1 % of all returned ballots have a signature that is rejected. Elections office staff then follow up with the voter. In many cases, signatures evolve over time as people age. A fresh voter registration usually clears up the issue.
After signature verification, the envelopes are gathered into batches of 200. Seasonal election office staff then check out these batches of 200 like a library book, extract the ballots from the envelopes, check for any tears or other damage to ballots, and lay them flat, ready for the tabulation process. Once done with each batch, they check them back in again like a library book and check out the next batch of 200, repeating the process for that batch and beyond.
These seasonal election office staff will start their work on October 28. Until then, ballot envelopes that have already arrived will go through the scanning and signature verification process, meaning there will be hundreds of batches ready for this team to process on day one.
The next step is moving the ballots through the tabulation machines. These machines tabulate the bubbles that voters have filled in. On Election Night at 8 p.m., all those bubbles that have been tabulated leading up to that point will produce Election Night results that will be posted on each county’s election office website not long after.
You can follow your ballot’s progress by visiting here. The website will show when your ballot envelope arrived at your county elections office, and that it has been processed. Snohomish County election office staff expect a high percentage of the more than 500,000 ballots mailed to registered voters to be returned.
If you still need to register to vote, that can be done online at votewa.gov/ until October 28. You can also register to vote in person at any county elections office through Election Day, November 5.
Your ballot is in hand. It is time to vote. Do so early enough and your vote will be among those in Election Night results.
