Election coming soon, officials are set to go

If you hadn’t noticed, there’s an election coming up pretty quickly.

The primary election is set for June 2 in California and ballots have already been mailed in Mariposa County.

Mariposa County Clerk Courtney Morrow, who is in charge of elections, said everything is ready to go and ballots are starting to come back into the office.

One point Morrow wanted to stress is how the drop-off boxes in the county work and how much another county department helps in the process.

“Public works does all of the ballot box delivery and retrieval,” she said.

Those drop boxes are “in every corner of the county,” said Morrow.

Locations include Mariposa, Lake Don Pedro, Yosemite National Park, El Portal, Triangle Road, Catheys Valley, Coulterville and Bootjack.

Morrow said state regulations require the boxes have to be retrieved once a week — and that’s where Mariposa County Public Works comes into the picture.

She said for years, the public works department has helped set up polling locations and more, but when mail-in voting was put into place in the county, the drop boxes became even more important.

The way it works, she said, is public works “piggybacks on existing routes” they use on a weekly basis. In going about their routine duties, they also stop and replace the ballot boxes.

The system in place is secure, stressed Morrow .

The boxes are sealed with numbered tags in the clerk’s office in Mariposa. Public works personnel come to the office and pick up the sealed boxes. Those seals are verified by a clerk’s office employee and the public works employee. Both sign off on a sheet.

When the new boxes are delivered, they are again verified by the public works employee and someone at the business where they are dropped. Again, a sheet is signed.

“It’s pretty intense security,” said Morrow.

She also noted public works employees “travel in twos” and “they are already county employees.” That means they work under the same oath of office as all county employees.

Morrow said she wanted to set the record straight on how the process works because some public works employees “do catch some crap. They are questioned about security measures.”

She said the public works employees now hand out information about the elections to anyone interested.

“I don’t want them to catch slack,” she said.

The process began last week when the first drop boxes were taken to the locations.

“Ballot boxes are popular,” said Morrow.

Morrow said the boxes are placed where there are regular business hours, generally a business or public entity.

Mariposa County went to all mail-in ballots in 2018 and Morrow said she is “grateful we made that move. I have always been a fan of mail-in ballots.”

Even before the switch was made to all mail-in ballots, voters in Mariposa County were using the system. She said about 60 percent of the votes came in that way, as compared to 100 percent now.

Every registered voter in the county is mailed a ballot 29 days before an election.

Once filled out, the ballots can either be sent back to the clerk’s office by U.S. Mail or placed in a drop box. No postage is necessary to mail them back.

Big ballot

For the upcoming primary election, the ballot is quite large.

Because of so many candidates running for governor, the ballot is 22 inches long, said Morrow.

However, it is printed on one, two-sided sheet, she said.

The alternative is two sheets, something Morrow said they did once and “I will never do again.”

Tests have already been conducted on the ballots and Morrow reports everything “tested well.”

Morrow said she has been pleased with how the system has been working over the past few elections.

In California, elections officials can start processing ballots seven days before an election. That means those which come in by mail or from ballot drop boxes can be entered into the system.

No tallying can be done until election night, but Morrow said by being able to get them scanned “has streamlined the process.”

The 50 percent plus one rule

This year’s local election has two contested races.

One is for assessor recorder where Tammie Guenthart, the person appointed to that position following a resignation, will face Jenifer Canter. That race has become pretty high profile considering the nature of the office.

In that race, the winner will become the next officeholder.

But in the race for District 1 supervisor, it’s a little different.

There are three candidates for the position to replace Supervisor Rosmarie Smallcombe, who is not seeking reelection.

On the ballot are Lisa Edelheit, Stanley Bissmeyer and Adam McLane.

In this case, it’s possible there could be another election in the November — but not necessarily.

As Morrow explained, if any of those three candidates gets 50 percent plus one vote, that person will be declared the winner and take the supervisor seat in January 2027.

But if nobody gets to that level, the top two vote-getters in the race will advance to the November general election.

Morrow said she received a question about why that system is in place and noted it’s because of state law.

Morrow is expecting a fairly high turnout for the election, especially because of the local races.

“The local stuff brings out more voters,” said Morrow.

She estimated voter turnout could approach 70 percent.

Several people will also be running unopposed in the primary. Those are:

• Jeff Aranguena, county superintendent of schools.

• Neil Douglass, superior court judge

• Luis Mercado, county auditor

• Danette Toso, Supervisor District 3

• Courtney Morrow, treasurer/tax collector/ county clerk

The primary election will be held on Tuesday, June 2 with polls open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.