Mid-Ohio Valley election officials are seeing a high anticipated voter turnout

SAINT MARYS, W.Va. (WTAP) – Election officials on both sides of the Ohio River say turnout is higher than in any recent election.

In Pleasants County, Clerk of Elections Ryan McFarland said they had about 500 early voters in person by Friday afternoon — just three days after early voting.

That’s more than they had in the entire two weeks of early voting for the 2024 primary.

“Pretty close, I think it’s already been 9 percent turnout for this election,” he said. “So part of that is the polls will be less crowded on Election Day. And it sets us up to have a high turnout in this election.”

McFarland attributes the turnout to voters who feel that this election has particularly high stakes.

“I would say because it’s a presidential election and it’s such a contentious election,” he said. “A lot of people pay a lot of attention to the news. A lot of people are watching this election, so a lot of people really wanted to get out as soon as possible to get their vote.”

McFarland said the clerk’s office is prepared to handle the large turnout.

“We have some really good workers who know what they’re doing,” he said. “So we are preparing for the worst. And they always do very well. So we have all the supplies we need. They’ve all been training, so I think we’re set in a good place to help them get through the rest of the next seven days.”

Early voting in Ohio began earlier in Ohio than in West Virginia.

Washington County Board of Elections Deputy Director Karen Pawloski said an advance doesn’t mean things are slowing down.

“To date, we’ve had 11,968 voters cast their ballots, either here in the office or by absentee ballot,” she said.

That’s a 20 percent voter turnout for the county with Election Day and a full week of early voting left.

“This beats all the numbers we had in 2020,” Pawloski said. “Of course, that was during a pandemic, but we still had 76, or 75.6 percent turnout in 2020. We’re going to blow that one out of the water.”

Despite how busy they are, Pawloski said he doesn’t want the fear of a long wait to keep people from casting their ballots early.

“We have constituents calling and saying, ‘When is the off-peak time?’ and I really can’t answer that,” she said. “The lines I saw were about five people to our door and I don’t think anyone waited more than a minute and a half to be able to vote here in the office.”

Elsewhere in the region, Jackson County, West Virginia, registered 2,061 early voters — a 10 percent turnout. Wood County saw 3,321. And Wirt County registered 267 early voters.

Early voting ends Nov. 2 in West Virginia and Nov. 3 in Ohio.

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