October 28, 2016 - We feel that it's important to remind voters to only include their voted ballot in the ballot return envelope (not additional ballots). Occasionally we receive two ballots in one return envelope - and it almost always is the ballot of the spouse, significant other, child, etc. When two are included it's impossible to determine which ballot should be applied to the voter in the household.
Voting
October 26, 2016 - What if you still haven't received your ballot? There are a couple of clear options for you, but first an important point: If you changed your address after October 10th, and you normally receive your ballot every election, your ballot would have been sent to your old address. Why? When we mail the bulk of our ballots we must capture the data on a single day so that we can address the ballots.
October 25, 2016 - Ballot returns are flooding into our office ahead of Election Day. As of this morning, we have received 163,010 a 5.8% increase over 2012 for the same period. Out of these ballots 668 voters forgot to sign their ballot envelope. We have sent each of these voters an important letter - urging them to cure the lack of a signature. Fortunately, the vast majority of voters have signed their ballot envelope.
October 23, 2016 - California's Top Two Primary Act changed the way we vote in California. The top two vote-getters at the primary election advance to the general election for voter-nominated offices, even if both candidates have specified the same party preference designation. What are voter nominated offices? U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives, State Senate and State Assembly.
October 22, 2016 - With California's lengthy ballot your ballot could take two first-class stamps to mail. Depending on where you live your ballot may be longer than your cross-county neighbor. Some communities have more contests on the ballot. Take for instance, there are 17 state propositions on everyone's ballot - some cities will also have local council races and measures (one city has 8 additional measures).
October 11, 2016 - At a time when the world is watching our electoral process, a new film has been released showcasing how elections are really conducted - entitled Blueprints for Democracy: How We Vote.
October 10, 2016 - Over a period of three days last week we mailed 1.5 million vote pamphlets to Orange County voters. This is a large, complex operation involving multiple teams coordinating production, printing, proofing, mail preparation, etc. But we don't simply mail without ensuring these voter pamphlets have been delivered. The image below shows data on our mailing - and how the voter pamphlets were delivered countywide. Blue areas were mailed on 9/29, green areas were mailed on 9/30 and gold areas were mailed on 10/4.
October 6, 2016 - Prior to the June Primary Election we described how we analyze turnout data using data analysis tools from MIT. We now have additional data from the June Primary that has aided us in further analyzing trends to closely forecast the number of voting booths we will need at each polling place.
October 1, 2016 - As of today we have issued 7,635 ballots to members of the military and overseas civilians. But the interest level is obviously high - we are receiving 50+ new applications per day from these voters. This is good news - usually we see stronger interest in a general election versus a primary, but these numbers are higher than in past elections.
September 25, 2016 - If you are an overseas voter (UOCAVA) election officials are required to send your absentee ballot 45 days before an election for those who are registered and have requested a ballot. Last evening was that 45 day deadline. We completed sending all requests for overseas absentee ballots just before midnight. If you live or work overseas and submit a request within 45 days of the election, we will send your ballot as soon as possible, upon processing your form.