The King County Election Headquarters in Renton is packed on Tuesday with employees sorting and counting ballots.
Today all the ballots turned into drop boxes across the entirety of King County will go to that one facility. They are being delivered by trucks and vans constantly as people continue to drop them in last minute.
The ballots go through four steps. The envelopes will be scanned, then the signatures verified, then the ballot will be opened and later counted.
Chief of Staff for the King County Elections Kendall Hodson tells us more than 600,000 people are expected to vote in this local election.
“We are expecting as many as 300,000 ballots to be coming back to us today, that puts us at our projection of 45% turnout,” Hodson said.
Many of those voters are swinging by ballot boxes as the clock ticks closer to the 8pm drop-off deadline.
“Absolutely our voice matters so we can make a difference,” King County voter Adele said.
Voters like Akrem saying local elections are where your vote is the heaviest.
“It’s very important especially with how it is in Washington, I feel like everyone is worth looking at and voting as compared to overall elections where it’s like which poison do I pick,” Akrem said. “I feel like it actually matters here and I appreciate the opportunity to vote.”
Hodson said 250 people are working around the clock to make sure every vote is counted.
They tell us this number of ballots takes time to count carefully.
“We’ll have about 60% of results in tonight’s posting then we usually are fully caught up by Friday,” Hodson said.
She says the results won’t be verified for another three weeks, but unless a race is only votes apart, we will know frontrunners later this evening.
For those of you wondering about ballot security, Hodson tells us the ballot floor is secure with badge access, and then other spots require a fingerprint, so your vote is safe.