Voters head to Lancaster County Commissioner’s Office to cast early-voting ballots

LINCOLN, Neb. (KOLN) - The Midterm Election is on Tuesday, but the Lancaster County Election Commissioner’s Office was buzzing with people getting their ballots in early. This comes as volunteers and staff ready for Tuesday’s races.

Dozens of people have come in and filled out their ballots on Monday. The reason they’re early voting varies, but there’s a common thread throughout; They believe their voices will make a difference here in Lancaster County.

Nearly 50,000 voters, or a quarter of registered voters in Lancaster County, requested early ballots.

“We’ve had a team in now for about a week that’s been doing that opening those 42,000 ballots that we’ve gotten back, which is quite a task,” said Election Commissioner Dave Shively. “And then we have to keep them separated by precinct.”

Of national concern: Election fraud and election security. 10/11 NOW asked Shively if local voters should be concerned.

“We’ve worked with a Department of Homeland Security, the Secretary of State’s office in Nebraska, Secretary of State’s office we’ve done a large number of things to make sure things are as secure as we possibly can,” Shively said. “So I’m very comfortable that we’re as secure as we possibly can be here in Lancaster County.”

Bumping up security includes updating computers regularly, adding more cameras, and creating more secure counting rooms. Even still, Nebraskans can register to be poll watchers, people who go to a polling place and observe what’s going on.

“There’s some very specific things in state law that says you know, how far away they have to be from the ballots and the poll workers and that type of thing,” Shively said. “They can’t be disruptive.”

In the back of the election commissioner’s office, poll workers are collecting all the items they need to run their polling places.

The business is just a precursor, and at the booths and drive-ups, people are hoping their vote comes out on top.

This is Shively’s last election. He’s been doing this for 23 years.

Shively said he wants voters to know he and his staff are constantly doing everything they can to make voting safe and secure.

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