SPARTANBURG CO., (WSPA) -Early voting began Monday at 8:30 a.m. and lasted until 5 p.m. That is the time frame for voting every day of the week for this week and next week. There is no early voting on the weekends.
Early voting in Spartanburg County is being held at the Voter Registration and Elections Office in conference room six, on North Church Street.
“Local elections, they are very important,” John Baucom, Director of Voter Registration and Elections said. “ Hopefully people understand the importance of their local representation.”
If you are a registered voter you will need to have your ID ready once you step into the building.
Voting officials said the turnout for Monday’s election was lower than normal.
“There is usually a line of people that want to come and be among the first to vote,” Baucom said. “This morning we only had four people in line when we opened polls at 8:30am.”
However, we spoke with voters this morning who were eager to cast their vote.
“I’m very glad we came out today,” Spartanburg County resident Curtis Smith said. “This election in 2017 had the same resolution on the ballot for the billing of the courthouse and I wanted to see how the early voting was coming. It is not as big as it was in 2017 but there are still people coming out.”
There are a few items on the ballot voters said are very important to them in this election and they wanted to make sure their voice was heard.
“I wanted to make sure I got in voting early,” Spartanburg County resident Harry Miller said. “It is an important election especially with the school boards and the penny tax.”
Fourteen municipalities are also conducting elections this November in Spartanburg County, but as several voters told us, the school board and the penny sales tax are at the forefront of their mind when they come out to vote.
“I expected the penny sales tax to be the big driver of turnout,” Baucom said. “Normally school board election turnouts are in the 10% range and the last penny sales tax in 2017 the turnout was 15%.”
Voters who came out on the first day today said they want to warn others to not wait until it’s too late.
“You don’t have to wait until election day,” Smith said. “The legislature has got this set so that if you are busy on election day and all of a sudden you can’t get to the polls or it’s not a big deal for you at that point in time, you now have two weeks before.”
The deadline for early voting is November 3rd. The deadline to cast an absentee ballot is coming up on October 27th.
Election day is November 7th if you are not planning on voting early.
