Voting details explained for Luzerne County’s Nov. 8 general election

Whether by mail ballot or in-person, 204,207 Luzerne County residents are registered to cast ballots in the Nov. 8 general election.

Voters are free to pick candidates of any party affiliation in the general.

Four years ago, in the last gubernatorial general election of 2018, the county had 207,472 registered voters and 109,024 ballots cast, for a 52.55% turnout, county records show.

County Assistant Solicitor Michael Butera is predicting a higher 57.9% turnout in the upcoming general election for several reasons.

Butera, who has been involved in county elections for decades, said he believes turnout in 2018 was largely driven by then-U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta’s bid to unseat Sen. Bob Casey, with Casey prevailing.

He believes more voters will want to have a say in this year’s race for governor between Democrat Josh Shapiro and Republican Doug Mastriano, the U.S. Senate contest between Democrat John Fetterman and Republican Mehmet Oz and the U.S. House challenge between Democratic incumbent Matt Cartwright and Republican challenger Jim Bognet.

“You also have more competitive state representative races this time,” Butera said.

Future implications on abortion and the economy also will bring out more voters in this general election, Butera predicted.

“There are a lot of issues people are talking about,” he said.

Butera also credits former U.S. president Donald Trump for boosting voter turnout, saying his polarizing approach propelled more voters of all affiliations to respond through voting.

“One legacy we have from the Trump era is more people voting,” Butera said.

A final factor in the Butera’s prediction involves the voter pool itself.

The county had 3,265 more registered voters four years ago, but Butera said the 2018 count was likely artificially high, which could make that year’s turnout appear lower.

Since then, the county has purged thousands of voters from the rolls due to inactivity or their failure to respond to the county election bureau’s inquiries about address changes, officials have said.

New registrations have made up for some of these losses, and Butera said those newly added would be highly likely to cast ballots.

“Even though there are less voters registered, I think there will be more actual people voting,” he said. “The purge got rid of people who were not voting anyway.”

The county has 93,108 Democrats and 84,074 Republicans registered to vote Nov. 8, according to a state tally from Oct. 24, which was the registration deadline for the general election.

In addition, there are 20,481 voters with no affiliation in the county and 6,544 with other affiliations, the state report said.

Mail voting

Approximately 31,000 county voters have requested mail ballots for the general election.

The deadline to request mail ballots is 5 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 1, although officials had advised applying sooner, if possible, because that only allows a week for the ballots to be mailed to voters and returned to the county.

Voters have the option to visit the election bureau before 4 p.m. on Monday (Oct. 31) or Tuesday (Nov. 1) to apply for a mail ballot in person and, if approved, receive a ballot on the spot. The bureau is on the second floor of the county’s Penn Place Building, 20 N. Pennsylvania Ave., Wilkes-Barre. The bureau is open until 4:30 p.m., but voters should appear before 4 p.m. because it takes time to review mail ballot applications and print the ballots, officials said.

Instructions to apply for a mail ballot online are posted on the election bureau’s page at luzernecounty.org, but they will only be accepted if they are submitted before 5 p.m. on Nov. 1.

Completed mail ballots must be received in the county election bureau by 8 p.m. on Election Day, and postmarks do not count.

Voters can return their ballots by mail or deposit them in one of the county’s four drop boxes inside buildings.

The drop box hours for the general election:

• Wright Township Volunteer Fire Dept., 477 S. Main Road, Mountain Top — Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Closing on Nov. 7 at 5 p.m.

• Pittston Memorial Library, 47 Broad St., Pittston — Monday and Thursday, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.; Tuesday and Wednesday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Friday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.; and Saturday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Closing Nov. 7 at 4 p.m.

• Misericordia University (Passan Hall), 100 Lake St., Dallas — Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.; weekends, 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Closing Nov. 7 at 5 p.m.

• Penn Place, 20 N. Pennsylvania Ave., Wilkes-Barre — Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Penn Place, which is county-owned and houses the election bureau, is the only drop box location available on Election Day, and it will be accessible until 8 p.m. that day.

Mail voters receive instructions, a ballot, an unmarked white secrecy envelope and an outer envelope that contains the voter’s name and a label with a bar code that, when scanned, identifies that voter in the state’s database.

Some reminders to ensure mail ballots are counted:

• After filling out their ballot, voters must place it in the secrecy envelope, seal it and then put that envelope inside the one with the label/barcode to be returned to the county.

• Don’t write anything on the outside of the secrecy envelope, especially names or identifying marks.

• Sign and date the outer envelope where indicated.

• Fully shade in the ovals on the ballot and don’t mark choices with an X or slash.

• Be careful not to select more than the specified number of candidates.

• Only one ballot should be placed inside a secrecy or mailing envelope. The county cannot count multiple ballots in the same envelope, such as those for a couple, because there would be no way to determine which ballot is tied to the voter listed on the envelope with the bar code.

• Don’t place tape, staples or stickers on the ballot or envelopes, particularly over the bar code.

Disabled voters can complete a form designating a third party to deliver a mail ballot on their behalf. Otherwise, voters must return only their own ballots under state law. A link to the designee form is posted at luzernecounty.org.

Letters were sent to all county nursing and personal care homes explaining the legal limitations for ballot delivery.

Information also is posted under the election bureau’s ballot drop box link at luzernecounty.org.

In-person voting

To help voters prepare, the county has posted sample ballots on the election bureau page at luzernecounty.org.

Polling places will be open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.

A list of all polling places appears in this special section. Voters also can view a list of all polling places under the election bureau’s general election link at luzernecounty.org.

The county has 186 precincts housed at 143 locations, with some spots hosting multiple precincts, the bureau said.

Only two polling places are changing for the general — Harveys Lake, which will return to the borough building, and Hazleton Ward 5, which will be switched to Holy Rosary Church. New registration cards were issued to impacted voters.

At this time, wearing a mask is optional for both voters and poll workers.

At the polls, voters make selections on touchscreen machines and then receive a paper ballot printout to verify their choices. After reviewing this printout, voters must feed the paper into a tabulator.

County officials emphasize voters should not leave the polling place with this paper because it must be entered into the tabulator to lock in their vote.

Those with questions or concerns about the ballot marking devices, printouts or tabulators — or anything else they encounter in the polling place — should alert the judge of elections before they cast their ballots so the judge can assess the situation and, if warranted, resolve it, officials say.

First-time voters should bring proper identification materials. Approved forms of photo identification include a Pennsylvania driver’s license or PennDOT identification card, a U.S. passport, or ID issued by any Pennsylvania government agency, the U.S. government, the U.S. armed forces, an employer or educational institution, the state said. Non-photo identification must contain the voter’s name and address and can include confirmation issued by the county election bureau, non-photo ID issued by Pennsylvania or the U.S. government, a firearm permit, government check or current paycheck, bank statement or utility bill.

Mail voters who did not return their ballots also can bring the ballot package that had been sent to them — the ballot and both envelopes — to their polling place so it can be voided, allowing them to cast their ballot on the electronic ballot marking devices.

Voters who requested but never received a mail ballot can cast a paper provisional ballot at the polls.

Provisional ballots are marked by hand and reviewed last so the county can verify a mail ballot was not also received from that voter. The details are important for provisional ballots. They must be placed in a secrecy envelope, which is then inserted in an outer envelope. Three signatures — two from the voter and one from the judge of elections — are required on the outer envelope for the vote to count.

Voters will sign in on paper poll books instead of electronic ones due to a continuing county assessment of which option should be used in future elections.

Election results

A team of workers assisting with the processing of mail ballots will be sworn in the day before the election.

The process to start unsealing mail ballot envelopes and scanning the ballots, known as pre-canvassing, begins at 7 a.m. on Election Day inside a third-floor courtroom at Penn Place.

By law, counties cannot start uploading mail ballot results — known as canvassing — until the polls close at 8 p.m., officials said.

Observation of pre-canvassing and canvassing is limited to political party officials and candidates or their representatives, and all observers must have watcher certificates obtained through the election bureau.

As usual, results will be posted and updated at luzernecounty.org after the polls close.

The state’s electionreturns.pa.gov site will provide updated unofficial results in state races.

An area for the public to view results will be set up in Penn Place after 8 p.m.

Voters may call 570-825-1715 or email [email protected] for assistance or to report any issues.

The county must complete its unofficial tally of ballots, including mail ones, by midnight on election night as a condition for its acceptance of a new $1.04 million election integrity grant. The county used portions of the grant to hire additional temporary workers and purchase a new mail ballot sorting machine.

The election bureau requested the machine to speed up election night tallying and reduce staff needed to manually scan mail ballot outer envelopes to mark them as received. Based on the envelope weight, the machine also will instantly weed out those missing required inner secrecy envelopes or containing more than the one permissible ballot inside, the administration has said.

Reach Jennifer Learn-Andes at 570-991-6388 or on Twitter @TLJenLearnAndes.