OHIO — The Delaware County Fairgrounds welcomed a steady stream of voters for Tuesday’s Election Day.
One poll manager said he saw about 250 people every hour, a large increase from what was reported over the summer for the special election. Delaware County had one of the closer vote counts between Trump and Biden in the 2020 election.
While Delaware County locals voted in the big races like the Senate, there were also a couple local issues.
The city proposed a tax levy that would allocate more funds to the local school district and asked to renew a current levy that would aid senior citizens. Inflation and immigration are two big topics that are important aside from the local tax levies and bond issues.
Ivana Mostofi, said reproductive rights are what motivated her to come to the polls.
“It’s so important that we maintain our freedom and one of the biggest issues that I’m concerned about is making sure that women are able to make decisions about their bodies and that’s not taken away,” said Mostofi.
Young voters have been a target audience for both the Democrats and Republicans. Voters of all ages came out to the Delaware County Fairgrounds. Some were first-time voters who felt it their generation’s responsibility to decide where the country is headed.
“We’re eventually going to grow up and have to deal with some of these problems that we’re having to talk about now, especially having to stop problems before they become so serious that the upper parts of the government have to deal with,” said first-time voter Joshua Bucher.
Franklin County was another county to watch. It is one of the biggest in the state, with hundreds of poll locations scattered across Central Ohio. There are more than 800 precincts in Franklin County with almost 900,000 registered voters.
In Franklin County, security and safety have been key in ensuring each vote is sacred. While most precincts reported no issues regarding voter intimidation, one polling place on the westside of Columbus reported a man armed with a gun allegedly passing out pamphlets of some sort. Public Information Officer Aaron Sellers said the situation was handled cautiously.
The county allocates one express vote ballot box for every 343 voters. A single precinct has a minimum of six express vote boxes and some larger locations have more. Sellers said that some locations had high turnout and actually requested additional ballots.
“Whetstone we ended up taking some additional machines out there so there were a lot of people there,” said Sellers. ”Some of our suburban areas, I was in Worthington earlier dropping off some additional paper ballots and there was a line almost out the door so a lot of the places but predominantly your larger locations.”
The Franklin County Board of Elections was busy all night as votes continued to get dropped off. While the Franklin County Board of Elections staff is around 50 people, they had thousands of people help with the election process.
Sellers said the Board employed 5,000 poll workers for this election. They also collaborate with local police officials like the Columbus Police Department and the Franklin County Sheriff’s Office to make sure everyone and every vote is safe.
“Everything is done in bipartisan teams, Republicans, Democrats, so I think people in Ohio should rest assured that votes that they’re going to see cast tonight are legitimate and they should be proud that it works in Ohio,” said Sellers.
According to the Franklin County BOE, 2018 election voter turnout was at around 55%. Sellers said he feels this election could match or beat that.
