As early in-person voting comes to a close, Northern Colorado election officials are making their plea to mail-in ballot voters to return their envelopes as soon as possible before Election Day.
In Larimer County, about 75 percent of active voters are casting their ballots via mail. But Clerk and Recorder Scott Doyle says just over 50 percent of those ballots have been filled out and returned to his office.
“For those to all be dropped on us on Tuesday, we can’t process them,” said Doyle who spoke to KUNC at an early voting site in south Fort Collins.
Next door in Weld County, Clerk and Recorder Steve Moreno was also making his case. He said that so far the county has received about 57 percent of the mail-in ballots it sent out. Moreno said that if everyone waits to return their ballot, processing an estimated 15,000 envelopes on Election Day would be very challenging.
“A lot of individuals don’t understand there’s a reconciling process before it even gets to the County Board to open the envelope and process that,” he said.
While Weld County is not staffing drop off locations over the weekend for mail-in ballots, Larimer County plans to accept mail-in ballots at its six early voting sites on Saturday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Starting Monday, both Larimer and Weld counties will accept mail-in ballots at early voting sites from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Larimer County is also offering a drive-through mail-in ballot drop off at two sites on Monday:
- Across the street on the west side of the Larimer County Courthouse at 200 West Oak Street in Fort Collins (in the old Steele’s Market parking lot).
- At the curb outside the west side of the Loveland Motor Vehicle office at 205 E 6th Street in Loveland (on Lincoln Avenue just north of the 6th Street intersection).
On Tuesday, Election Day, both Larimer and Weld counties will have voting centers open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
