Saturday, Oct. 19 is B.C.'s provincial general election voting day, with polling stations open from 8 a.m. until 8 p.m. province-wide. NanaimoNewsNOW will provide live coverage of the results starting at 7 p.m. (File Photo/NanaimoNewsNOW)

By NanaimoNewsNOW Staff

vote

Election Day: where to vote and our coverage of results across Nanaimo & Oceanside

Oct 19, 2024 | 6:51 AM

NANAIMO — It’s general voting day for the 2024 B.C. election.

Polling stations are open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 19 with voters encouraged to visit the voting place assigned to them on the mailed ‘Where to Vote’ card, however ballots can be cast at any polling station in the riding.

A complete list of open polling stations is available through the Elections BC website. Voters can also go to any district electoral office across B.C. until 4 p.m. to cast ballots in their riding.

Those still wanting to cast a mail-in ballot, who have their package already, can drop them off at a polling station or district electoral office before 8 p.m.

All voters must prove their identity to receive a ballot.

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Elections BC requires either a BC driver’s license, BC Identification Card, BC Services Card, another provincial or federal government ID or Certificate of Indian status.

People without any of those documents can instead provide two of any in a long list of documents, or take other steps, outlined here on the Elections BC website.

For complete information on the local ridings and candidates, visit our Election Centre.

Local coverage of the results
Visit NanaimoNewsNOW beginning at 7 p.m. for live reactions and results from four central Vancouver Island ridings: Nanaimo-Gabriola, Nanaimo-Lantzville, Ladysmith-Oceanside and Mid-Island Pacific Rim.

We’ll run a live blog online featuring the latest vote counts, audio and video from campaign events.

Our radio partners (106.9 The Wolf, 102.3 The Wave, 88.5 The Beach and The Lounge 99.9) will also have coverage multiple times per hour until midnight, featuring on-location reports, analysis and interviews with the candidates.

Results are expected to come quick as new electronic voting machines rolled out for this election by Elections BC are promising a vast majority of results from most ridings to be available within an hour of polls closing.

New electronic vote counters are promising faster results, and were debuted on a large scale this election cycle in a bid to encourage more voters out to the polls. (The Canadian Press)

Advance voting records
A considerable number of people have already cast their ballots in the 2024 election.

Elections BC reported 1,001,331 votes were received during a six-day advance voting period which ended Wednesday, Oct. 16.

Around a third of voters in Nanaimo and Oceanside took advantage.

Ladysmith-Oceanside led the way with 15,655 votes which was the sixth most across all B.C. ridings. Nanaimo-Lantzville saw 15,032 ballots while Nanaimo-Gabriola had 14,141 ballots registered.

The total number of advance ballots cast easily eclipsed the record 671,231 votes done over the same period in 2020.

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