BUCKHANNON – The deadline to register to vote or update your voter’s registration information in West Virginia in the Nov. 3, 2020 General Election – Tuesday, Oct. 13 – is now less than a week away.
Upshur County Clerk Carol Smith encouraged all Upshur County residents to register to vote and update any information on their voter registration before the deadline.
“The easiest way to do it is to visit the Secretary of State’s website, which is govotewv.com, and they can register and update their voter information there,” Smith said. “If they choose to, they can click on upshurcounty.org and I have a registration form there that they can complete and mail in, or they’re welcome to come into the county clerk’s office to register to vote.”
Early voting will start Oct. 21 with COVID-19 protective measures in place.
“We will have tents set up outside, and we are going to rearrange the hallway just a little bit to allow for more voters at one time, so the exiting process will be a little different than what everyone is used to,” Smith said. “We are going to not have as many voters allowed inside the courthouse at one time to try to keep people socially distanced, and we may have somebody running crowd control.”
Everyone who votes in person, early or on Election Day, Nov. 3, will be given a pen with a stylus on the end, so voters will have their own individual utensil to sign documents and use the voting machine with, without actually touching the machine itself.
“They’re super cute, and everybody who comes to vote in person will get a pen,” Smith said. “It’s a stylus pen and it says, ‘I voted’ on it and has the county’s website on it. Those pens will be used to sign, and they’ll be able to use the stylus to vote on the machine, and then they can take it with them when they are done.”
As of Oct. 6, Smith said they have sent out 1,328 absentee ballots.
“During a normal election, we would get maybe around 80, and the most I have ever received until this particular year was 168, I believe,” Smith said.
Smith said if a person is still planning to vote absentee, they should turn in their absentee ballot request soon.
“If you’re going to do absentee, please get your absentee ballot request in so we can get your ballot mailed to you and get them returned in a timely fashion,” Smith said. “If you’re going to come in person and vote, either early voting or on Election Day, just please remember to wear a mask for your own safety.”
Smith said she also wanted to remined everyone not to wear or bring campaign material into a voting precinct.
“People may have masks with candidate information on them or names, so just remember – do not wear those masks to polling locations,” Smith said. “You’re not allowed to wear any kind of campaign material into the voting precincts, and you can’t have hats, pins, shirts or flyers that you can leave laying around, so no campaign materials.”
To register to vote or update your registration, click here.
Early voting will take place from Oct. 21 through Oct. 31, with the courthouse being open from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on weekdays and from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on the two Saturdays, Oct. 24 and Oct. 31.
