Carbon County voters who have applied for mail-in ballots should be getting them in the coming weeks.

On Thursday, Commissioners’ Chairman Wayne Nothstein announced that the state finally certified the ballot so the county’s ballots for the upcoming presidential election were expected to be back from the printers this past Saturday.

A total of 8,554 applications have been received for mail-in ballots through Thursday morning, so the county printed 11,000 mail-in ballots since they are anticipating at least 10,000 applications by the mail-in ballot application deadline.

Nothstein stressed that anyone who already applied for a mail-in ballot should not apply again.

“It overburdens our office tremendously,” he said, noting that all applications must be cross-checked to make sure only one application has been approved. “It stresses everyone out.”

He added that if you are not sure if you applied, you should call the elections office before applying a second time.

Other issues

Nothstein also stressed the importance of returning your mail-in ballots early.

“Help counties ensure election results,” he said, noting that if you put your ballot in the mail on Election Day, it will not get to the county on that day.

He said that some people in the state think that counties can just take the ballots and scan them in, but it is more time consuming than that with double-checking to make sure the voter didn’t then go to the polls and vote in person.

Election officials must also make sure the returned ballots are mailed in the secrecy envelopes, and if they are not, those must be disqualified from the results.

Nothstein also said that the county must discuss drop boxes, which the court ruling now allows.

“I’m against that,” he said, noting that he doesn’t have a problem with the drop box mail slot currently at the elections office because it is secured, but not the remote locations.

No further discussion took place on if Carbon will opt in to that.

Carbon County currently has 45,755 registered voters for the upcoming election.

The deadline to register to vote is Oct. 19.