 Registered voters can receive and submit absentee ballots beginning
Sept. 23. They can also show up at designated early voting locations
between Oct. 11 and Oct. 28, including weekends, to turn in their
ballots.
Rupert Borgsmiller, assistant executive director for the Illinois
State Board of Elections, said the early voting dates and absentee
ballots allow the county clerks and the state board more time to
process votes.
"The judges aren't having to process all of the numbers that they
would normally expect that would come through the precinct. A lot
of those (ballots to count) have gone down on the day of the
election because (of) the people going and voting early," he said.
One new wrinkle for this year's election is the mandated addition of
public universities as locations for early voting and grace-period
registration.
This summer, Gov. Pat Quinn signed a new law that would require
county clerks to establish early voting and grace-period
registration in "high-traffic" sites for each of the state's nine
public universities.
Grace-period registration creates a streamlined registration process
for those previously unregistered to vote, and it is scheduled to go
from Oct. 6 to Oct. 26.
The new public university law is a pilot program that would expire
in 2011, after the conclusion of this November's general election.
Larry Reinhardt, Jackson County clerk in southern Illinois, said
early voters make up around 20 percent of all voters in his area. He
expected to see an uptick in the percentage of early voters for this
general election.
"Political parties and some voter groups are gearing up for a heavy
early vote drive, a get-out-the-vote effort. So it'll be interesting
to see which one is more effective and whether any of them are
effective," he said.
Reinhardt said students from Southern Illinois University at
Carbondale may come out for SIUC law professor Sheila Simon, who
is Gov. Pat Quinn's running mate.
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Megan Nelson, chief deputy clerk for McLean County, said they were
using press releases and newspaper reports to spread word about
early voting.
Nelson added that county administrators were focused on getting the
vote out at Illinois State University.
"We've asked the president of Illinois State (Dr. Al Bowman) to
please also submit this letter to all the students via e-mail. So
we're trying to get it out to students that we will have (an early
voting site) there," she said.
Borgsmiller was not sure how overall voter turnout would be affected
by early voting, but he did think early voting would become more
popular because it creates a greater number of voting opportunities.
"I think the trend is that more and more people are utilizing the
early voting versus waiting until the day of the election to go
vote," he said.
To learn more about early voting, visit the website of the Illinois
State Board of Elections at http://www.elections.il.gov/.
[Illinois
Statehouse News; By KEVIN LEE]
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