Lisa Dart doesn’t have a lot of downtime these days.

Carbon County’s Director of Elections has been flooded with applications for absentee and mail-in ballots.

And it’s probably not going to slow down anytime soon.

“We’re getting between 300 and 500 applications a day,” she said Thursday. “Today we just got another 300 plus whatever’s in the computer pending.”

While the total is staggering, Dart also noted the complications caused by some of the mail-in applications that have been coming in to the county’s elections office.

“They did these mass mailers, the RNC and the DNC, and what happens is they send you an application and it’s already completed, and all you have to do is sign it for a mail-in,” said Dart.

“But people are just signing them and sending them in. So yesterday I think I had 75 duplicates.

“So it’s taking us twice as long because we have to enter it and decline it. The ones we decline online, they just get an email so it’s easier. But the ones that don’t, or they’re not registered and they just fill out the mail-in. So we’re just trying to get out there that they need to call. If they’re not sure, if they can’t look online on the state’s website - because you can check your registration and everything - but if they don’t, they have to just call us because it’s easier. It’s a lot of calls, but at least we don’t have to process things two and three times.”

Carbon County Commissioners’ Chairman Wayne Nothstein took time during Thursday’s meeting to try to clear up any confusion the process has caused.

“The absentee ballots will not be mailed out until mid-September,” Nothstein said. “You can go online and see if you are registered. There’s some confusion out there about receiving absentee ballots from two different sources; people are sending them in twice.

“If you have any doubt you’re registered for the absentee ballot you can go online and check or you can call the election office. They’re extremely busy down there and I think we’re going to continue up until the deadline for the applications.”

The office currently has just three employees working on all of the applications.

“We’re up to over 5,000 mail-ins, as of Monday,” said Dart. “And we had 6,700 in the primary. The state is expecting like 58%, for the election they’re expecting 27,000; I’m expecting like 15(,000).

“But I could be wrong, because we’re getting so many each day, and they have until Oct. 27.”

Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 3.

“You know when you go to the post office and you have that little yellow paper in there that says you’re too full for your mailbox? Yeah, we get that every day,” Dart laughed. “Well, not every day. But at least three days a week.

“We just keep processing.”

Those with questions regarding their status can call the office at 570-325-4801. The office is open from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.