As the state of Iowa set a new record for voter turnout in this past Tuesday’s general election, Greene County helped to play a part in that.
According to the Secretary of State’s Office, more than 1,697,000 people voted Tuesday, which surpassed the previous record set in 2012 of 1,589,951. According to the Greene County Auditor’s Office, of the 6,674 registered voters, 5,081 ballots were cast Tuesday for a 76.13-percent voter turnout. Greene County Deputy Auditor Billie Hoskins says in her 22 years of working in the auditor’s office, that is the highest voter turnout she’s seen in a general election.
Comparing this year’s voter turnout to the 2016 general election’s 71-percent turnout and the 2018 midterm election with 62-percent. The absentee and early voting numbers were also higher than normal. The auditor’s office is reporting 3,168 absentees from Tuesday’s election, which surpass 2016 absentees of 1,940. Hoskins gave her impression of the nearly half of the registered voting population that voted absentee.
“If you look at past results for absentee voting, it seems like the trend keeps going up for every general election. So that part of it, I’m not surprised. But with covid and just the publicity nationwide, yeah we had an overwhelming amount of absentees in Greene County, and statewide.”
Hoskins says in-person voting on Election Day went about as smooth as it could have, considering the precautions that were taken due to the pandemic. She talks about one aspect that poll workers at the various polling locations had to deal with.
“The main thing that we had to tackle – and it has to do with covid – is we had more people that were wanting to curbside vote, which they could do at the polling place. We had more of that the polling location, which takes more time for our poll workers because two of them have to go and assist the voter.”
Auditor Jane Heun says as of Wednesday, there were 52 outstanding absentee ballots. Greene County’s election results will remain unofficial until the County Board of Supervisors canvass the votes at their regular meeting on Monday.