SLO County has 29,000 ballots to count and more coming. Here’s when we’ll get an update
Election Day has come and gone, but if you’re still on the edge of your seat waiting for election results, you’re going to have to wait a while.
It could take up to a month for final totals, and we’re likely only about halfway through the count.
As of 12:30 a.m. on Wednesday, the San Luis Obispo County Clerk-Recorder’s Office had finished its total Election Day tally, counting 58,096 ballots of the 182,291 mailed to voters.
That puts voter participation at just under 32%, but that figure will increase as more vote-by-mail ballots arrive at the Elections Office.
“I am happy with the turnout as of Election Day,” SLO County Clerk-Recorder Elaina Cano said, noting that she was pleased that the rain didn’t stop voters from casting their ballots.
The Election Night vote count includes ballots cast at the polls on Tuesday and received by mail before Election Day.
County staff will continue counting mail-in ballots, and Cano said she expects thousands more to arrive at her office over the next seven days.
So far, that number left to count is already at more than 29,000, Cano said in a news release Thursday.
Most of those are the approximately 22,720 vote-by-mail ballots returned at a polling place on Election Day, plus about 5,000 others received in the mail on Wednesday. In addition, another 559 ballots are currently classified as “challenged,” meaning they have verification issues that need to be resolved, such as a mismatched signature. And there are about 800 ballots that were voted provisionally on Tuesday.
Four types of ballots remain to be counted over the coming weeks:
- Last-minute vote-by-mail ballots that arrived the day before or on Election Day by mail, returned at a polling place or deposited in a drop box
- Vote-by-mail ballots postmarked by Election Day and received no later than seven days after Nov. 8
- Ballots with missing or mismatched signatures that must be verified
- Provisional ballots that must be researched and verified
By noon Thursday, Cano will post an estimate of how many unprocessed vote by mail ballots are left, she said, with the aim of certifying the election by Dec. 8.
Typically, voter participation reaches 60% to 70% during a midterm election — but Cano expects a lower turnout this year.
With only 31.9% participation so far, she thinks SLO County voter turnout will reach just under 60%.
This would mean about 51,279 mail-in ballots have yet to be counted — easily enough to flip close races like the competition for the District 2 seat on the San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors.
The Elections Office will start counting ballots again on Friday and release another ballot count report that day at about 5 p.m.
Elections office workers will be counting from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., even though it’s Veterans Day. The County Government Center will be closed, so anyone wishing to observe should call 805-781-5228 that day so a member of the team can escort you in.
Fewer voters cast ballots at the polls
On Election Day, 6,896 total ballots were cast at the polls, while 51,200 voters cast their ballots by mail.
“I’m not surprised that not a lot of people go to the polling places, because they’ve had the opportunity to vote at home,” Cano said.
In 2020, SLO County Election’s Office saw a significant increase in mail-in ballots. Over the past two years, the number of voters casting their ballots by mail has continued to increase, Cano said.
“The decline in people voting at the polls is pretty consistent at this point,” Cano said.
