Polling places across B.C. have opened for general voting in the 42nd General Election. (File Photo/NanaimoNewsNOW)

By NanaimoNewsNOW Staff

VOTING DAY

Polls open across province for 42nd General Election

Oct 24, 2020 | 7:56 AM

NANAIMO — Polls are open across the province for general voting.

Following seven days of advance polling where turnout in the three mid-Island ridings was above 2017 tallies, Saturday is the final opportunity to cast a ballot.

Elections BC recommends voting at the location assigned to you on your voting card, however a full list of available polling places for each riding is available on the Elections BC website.

Mail-in ballots have also come in record numbers with nearly 750,000 requested ahead of Saturday’s vote.

Andrew Watson from Elections BC said they must go through a significant process to vet and verify mail-in ballots against voter registration lists to eliminate cases of double voting.

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“Usually that takes 13 days and the count of absentee or mail in ballots takes around three days and the final results in a district are declared after that,” Watson said.

Around 11,000 mail-in ballots were requested with 6,500 submitted for the 2017 election.

The large increase in volume will cause significant delay in official results being known.

“On election night we count ballots from advance voting and election day. Usually in an election that’s 90 per cent of ballots in any given district.”

For more information on candidates running in the Nanaimo, Nanaimo-North Cowichan and Parksville-Qualicum ridings, visit our Election HQ section for biographies and candidate interviews.

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