T-L Photo/ROBERT A. DEFRANK Ralph W. Anderson of Morristown votes at the Belmont County Board of Elections office ahead of Election Day on Tuesday. Early, in-person voting will continue through Monday.

EARLY VOTING — whether by mail or in person — has been open for weeks, and many area residents have taken advantage of the chance to get their ballots in ahead of Election Day on Tuesday.

“Things will be good and accurate here in Belmont County,” elections Deputy Director Kamron Chervenak said. “We are averaging about 100-150 (voters) a day. It’s steady here. It’s not overwhelming, but it’s not slow. It’s a nice, steady pace.”

She added that more than 7,000 ballots were mailed out in the county, with 5,619 returned as of Thursday.

“There’s a substantial number, substantial growth in interest of voting by mail,” she said.

Chervenak said officials hope for a high turnout on Tuesday.

“It’s hard to speculate because it depends on the person, whether they want to vote early or not. People work, and it gives them an opportunity to vote without going out to the polls on Election Day,” she said.

She noted the absentee voting results are not updated until the polls close on Election Day.

“We don’t really get a jump start. When the polls close at 7:30 p.m. on Election Night is when we’re finally able to upload the results from the early voting and the absentee voting,” she said.

Chervenak did not comment on whether voters were passionate about any particular issue or race.

“Our office puts on the election, we do not do anything political or any campaigning,” she said.

Ideally, she is hoping for 100 percent voter participation from the 44,829 registered voters of Belmont County.

“You never know what voter turnout will be,” she said. “It depends on if there is an issue or a certain race is capturing the attention of the general public and the voting population.”

According to the board’s website, 53.10% of the county’s registered voters participated in the 2018 general election, the last “midterm” election that did not feature a presidential contest.

Dion Troiano, director of the Harrison County Board of Elections, said there have been 380 in-person votes cast at the board office in Cadiz so far.

“We’re averaging between 15 and 30 a day, depending on the day,” he said.

His office sent out about 1,100 absentee ballots, with 229 remaining to be returned.

“We’ve got a pretty good return rate sent back,” he said. “If we continue on at this pace, we will probably equal or beat our numbers for 2018, which was a little over 1,600. That would be great if we had a similar turnout to 2018 for absentee voting.”

He said there are 10,037 registered voters in the county.

“As far as Election Day itself goes, we’re probably going to see a grand total of 25-30 percent turnout, including our early and in-office voters. We might get closer to 40-45 percent, maybe 50 percent,” he said. “If we go above that, it would be a great turnout for us for a midterm election.”

Troiano said the turnout for 2018 was almost 58 percent.

“If we can meet that or exceed that for everything including Election Day, that would be fantastic,” he said.

Troiano said voters do not seem excessively excited about any one race or issue.

“A lot of them have done at least a little bit of research on what candidates they wanted to vote for. Of course, that may change on Election Day. People may come in and be gung-ho for one candidate or another,” he said.

He said there has been a growing trend of early voting.

“We’ve seen some steadily increasing numbers on average for … early voting. A lot of them are voters who saw what the pandemic did, they got a taste of voting by mail and they found it a lot easier and a lot more convenient,” he said. “It gives them more time to do research on candidates, and they don’t have to worry about being here on Election Day if they work a late shift or an early shift. … It’s a worry off their minds.

“We’re also getting a lot more ‘snow birds,'” he said. “A lot of them are saying there’s going to be a bad winter and they’re all flying or driving or what have you (to warmer places). … They’re not going to be here in November.”

Voting also is picking up in Monroe County.

“Right now, our in-person voting has started to pick up over the course of the last few days,” Mollie A. Landefeld, director at the Monroe County Board of Elections, said. “Right now, we still have just over 250 (absentee) ballots outstanding. … We mailed out 1,132.”

She added that 685 early in-person voters had stopped to vote at the board office as of Thursday. She said about 40 voters come into the board office to cast their ballots daily.

“Over the course of the last few days, we’ve bumped up to probably between 50 to 60 voters per day,” she said.

Landefeld said this was fewer than the number of early voters in 2018.

“We haven’t seen as many people or mailed out as many ballots,” she said.

She said she has not heard much talk about specific races or issues.

“They just know that it’s an even-numbered year, and that’s when they vote,” she said. “They just need to remember that the odd-numbered years are just as important as the even-numbered years.

“For a midterm, we generally get 52-55 percent voter turnout. I anticipate it being somewhere in the vicinity of 48-52 percent,” she said.

There are 9,266 registered voters in the county.

All the local officials said there have been no incidents among those coming in for early voting. They said there was no way to determine if there were more first-time voters.

“We do get a lot of people who do come in, are very excited because this is their first time to vote. We also see the people who have been voting 50 years,” Chervenak said.

Early, in-person voting extends through the weekend, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and 1-5 p.m. Sunday. The opportunity to vote early concludes from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday.

Voters can cast their ballots at their county board of elections office.

The Belmont County board office is located at 52180 National Road East, St Clairsville. The phone number is 740-526-0188.

The Harrison County board headquarters is located at 538 N. Main St., Cadiz. The phone number is 740-942-8866.

The Monroe County board office is located at 117 N. Main St., Woodsfield. The phone number is 740-472-0929.