Shawnee County sees uptick in advance ballots, hopes to recruit more election workers

With less than three weeks until the Aug. 4 primary election in Kansas, Shawnee County is seeing an uptick in the number of advanced ballots being requested locally. According to Shawnee County election commissioner Andrew Howell, his office had received more than 11,000 advance ballot requests as of Wednesday. He said that number is close to exceeding the volume of requests fielded by his office during the entire election season of 2018. “It’s early in the process, but it’s definitely up,” Howell said. He hasn’t yet heard many county residents voice concerns about in-person voting this year but said a few people have told him they requested advance ballots because they preferred not to go to the polls with COVID-19 cases on the rise.