Cobb Elections Board Seeks $255,000 To Mail Absentee Applications To Active Voters

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The Cobb County board of elections voted to ask county commissioners for funding to mail absentee applications to active voters for November.

Credit: Cobb County Elections

The Cobb County Board of Elections voted Monday to ask the county commission for more than a quarter of a million dollars to send vote-by-mail applications for the Nov. 3 general election.

More than 1.2 million Georgians voted by mail in the unprecedented June 9 primary election in the middle of a global health pandemic, aided in part by the Republican secretary of state's decision to mail applications to 6.9 million active voters.

So far, the state does not plan to repeat that mailing in the fall.

MORE: Here's What The Data Shows About Polling Places, Lines In Georgia's Primary

Cobb elections director Janine Eveler said the county received three quotes for mailing applications to more than 516,000 active voters, and the lowest came in at $255,724, or about 50 cents a ballot.

Eveler urged residents to take advantage of voting by mail, especially now that the state is creating an online absentee portal that should streamline the application process for counties and voters alike.

"With concerns about the COVID-19 pandemic likely to continue into the fall, we want to encourage voters to vote by mail and not in-person," she said. 

In the August 11 runoff so far, 16,296 Cobb voters have cast their ballots, more than 15,000 of them by mail. In the June primary, 106,832 mail-in ballots were returned, about 20% of the county's active voter population.

There are four secure drop-boxes in use for the primary election, and another 12 arrived in the elections office last week.

The board also voted to approve a polling place change to the SN2A precinct for November, moving more than 5,000 registered voters from the Smyrna Fire Station to a larger location at the First Baptist Church of Smyrna.