A ballot box outside the Anacapa St. side of the Santa Barbara County Administration building.
As of Tuesday afternoon, there were 101,000 ballots returned in Santa Barbara County.
In an interview with the News-Press, Santa Barbara County Clerk, Recorder, Assessor and Registrar of Voters Joe Holland said the most surprising thing about the ballots returned thus far is that a majority, 55,000, have been sent in through ballot drop boxes rather than vote by mail, which has been used to cast 46,000 ballots.
“It’s pretty amazing. These drop boxes have turned out to be very popular,” he said.
There are currently 30 voter drop boxes in Santa Barbara County and their locations can be found online at countyofsb.org/care/elections.
Roughly 55,000 of the returned ballots thus far have been Democrat, 24,000 Republican, and 19,000 have had no party preference. There is also a handful that are scattered among different parties.
Mr. Holland said there has been a fair increase in Santa Barbara County’s registered voters, growing from 227,000 in March to more than 235,000 registered voters now.
“Not a huge increase, but you’ve gotta remember that people can still register to vote now up through Election Day,” Mr. Holland remarked.
400 of the ballots returned to County Elections as of Monday were missing signatures and 200 ballots had signatures that didn’t match those on their corresponding voter registrations. To those individuals, County Elections will send letters detailing how to correct the missing or unmatching signatures.
In addition to the 30 drop boxes, starting Saturday, Oct. 31, County Elections will open 35 in-person voting locations. These will be open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Monday, and 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Election Day.
