Dem Counties in Ohio are reporting strong early voting turnouts

[WI_DEM]

Shirley Queener's vote is already cast. Exiting the Mahoning County Board of Elections offices Tuesday morning -- two weeks before Election Day -- Queener, of Youngstown, said she always votes but took advantage of early voting for the first time two years ago during the 2008 presidential election.
The lines are "long" on election day, "so this is nice," she said.
Queener is among the growing number of voters taking advantage of the ability to vote early in Ohio. Starting Sept. 28, registered voters have been able to cast ballots in person at county boards of elections and other designated locations in some Ohio counties. Cuyahoga and Franklin counties -- two traditional Democratic strongholds -- report voters are participating in early voting at high rates.
Locally, heavily Democratic Mahoning and Trumbull counties also are reporting high early voting activity, according to elections officials in both counties.
"Since the last governor's election, what we've seen is a 25% to 40% increase every year in the number of people who voted absentee in that election for years prior," said Tom McCabe, director of the Mahoning elections board. During this year's primary, he reported, 40% more voters cast ballots by absentee and early voting than during the 2006 primary, a trend he says is evident around the state.
As of Tuesday, the Mahoning elections board had received 14,000 absentee and early ballots, the number it received up to just before Election Day four years ago, McCabe reported. "We're still getting about 250 people in per day voting at the counter on average, and about 1,000 pieces of mail requesting an absentee to be sent," he said.
Early and absentee voting should reach 25,000 ballots this year, he projected.
The Trumbull County Board of Elections has similarly received more requests for absentee ballots than it did four years ago, during the last gubernatorial election, said Kelly Pallante, director. This year, the board has already received 10,851 requests for ballots, compared with 10,492 for the 2006 general election. Counter traffic for casting ballots is 150 to 200 voters per day.
"The people are obviously interested in this election and they must have their minds made up," she said.
Among those taking advantage of early voting are truck drivers, who aren't certain they will be in town on Election Day, and health care workers, Pallante said. "There's just a variety of reasons why people use this," she said.

http://business-journal.com/more-absentee-ballots-early-voting-p17736-1.htm

But something special is going on in two Ohio Democratic strongholds: Cuyahoga and Franklin counties.I track on this handy web page that other places around the country -- including other Ohio counties -- are so far reporting low single digit early voting rates. In stark contrast, over 112,000 votes have already been cast in these two Ohio counties. As a comparison, this represents over ten percent of all ballots cast in the 2006 election in these counties, with still some time to go.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-p-mcdonald/early-voting-off-to-a-fas_b_763074.html

[madmom]

1. My family and I have already voted, as have most of my friends. All dems BTW.