Voters invited to avoid election day tsunami

February 1, 2008

Local voters have the opportunity to vote early and avoid the Election Day rush Tuesday.

On Saturday, Feb. 2, and Monday, Feb. 4, voters can drop off absentee ballots or vote in person at the San Mateo County Elections Office on the first floor of 555 County Center, located on Bradford Street near Middlefield Road in Redwood City. The office will be open from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday and from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday.

Polls will be open on Election Day, Feb. 5, from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.

The Elections Office says it has received only 38 percent of the almost 123,000 mail-in ballots that were issued to registered voters who requested them.

"It seems that some voters haven't made up their mind," said Warren Slocum, the county's chief elections officer, in a press release.

For more information on early voting, call the San Mateo County Elections Office at 312-5222.

State voters

Meanwhile, on the state level, there are 700,000 more voters registered than there were at this time before the last presidential primary four years ago, Secretary of State Debra Bowen reported in a press release. Total statewide registration is 15,712,753. Of those, 43 percent are registered as Democrats, 33 percent as Republican, and 19 percent as "decline to state."

The "decline to state" category has grown the most in the past four years from 16.43 percent of total registrants to 19.37 percent, according to the state's registration report.

While the overall number of registered voters has grown, the percentage of eligible voters who are registered actually dropped slightly in the past four years, from 69 percent to 68.5 percent, the report says.

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