Voter turnout in most parts of Colorado hovered well under 50 percent Tuesday, in contrast to the intense interest shown to last year’s election.
Even as last-minute mail-in ballots streamed steadily into clerks’ offices across Colorado, most clerks reported manageable workloads and few problems on election night.
Boulder and El Paso counties were projecting final turnout of about 35 percent of eligible voters. Adams, Arapahoe, Denver, Doug las and Jefferson counties all expected turnouts of 25 percent to 30 percent.
Josh Liss, the deputy of elections for Jefferson County, said the turnout this year was in line with similar odd-year elections following presidential elections.
“It’s lower than we’d like, obviously,” Liss said, “but not entirely abnormal.”
Part of the reason for the low turnout figures, Liss said, was the huge interest in the 2008 election — when more than 90 percent of the state’s active voters cast ballots.
Registration drives in the run-up to that election swelled the state’s voting rolls, causing clerks to send out large numbers of ballots for this year’s mail-ballot-only election. But a number of voters on the election rolls may have since moved — meaning they wouldn’t have automatically received a mail-in ballot this year — or lost interest.
Also keeping turnout lower this year may have been the absence of a statewide issue to drive voter interest, said Boulder County clerk’s spokeswoman Jessie Cornelius.
In El Paso County, elections manager Liz Olson credited two tax-related ballot measures for pushing the county’s turnout figure higher than in other counties.
“I’m sure that probably drew voters out,” she said.
The slow-but-steady turnout meant clerks reported few problems keeping up with ballot processing and counting. Most clerks expected to have completed unofficial results by the end of the night.
“It’s been very, very smooth,” said Douglas County Clerk Jack Arrowsmith.
Secretary of State Bernie Buescher visited four metro-area counties Tuesday afternoon to observe their vote-counting procedures and said he saw no backups or other problems. Buescher said volunteers in the counties were moving efficiently to verify signatures and scan incoming ballots.
“It’s just been very, very workmanlike,” Buescher said. “They’ll all current. None of them are running behind.”
John Ingold: 303-954-1068 or jingold@denverpost.com
