Casting your ballot: How the primary works

Sun., Sept. 12, 2004

The Spokesman-Review

This year’s primary will be a whole new experience for Washington voters – one that many are unhappy about, judging from the complaints to state and local elections officials.

For the first time in seven decades, Washingtonians will have to vote for a single-party ballot in the primary. (Voting in the general election won’t change.) The new primary follows a federal court ruling in a case brought by the major political parties, which said the primary was unconstitutional. The way you vote Tuesday is a result of the Legislature’s solution to that problem.

Here’s the way it works on Election Day: You will be given four ballots; deposit the three you don’t want to use in a locked receptacle, and take the one you do want to the booth, and mark it for the candidates of your choice.

In some counties, you’ll be given one ballot with all the races, grouped by party, and you’ll have to stick with just one party’s candidates.

Remember to check for the nonpartisan races, which will be in a separate spot on the ballot, maybe on the back.

Picking a ballot: This is up to each individual voter. You don’t register by party, so you can pick any one. Or you can skip party politics and vote only in the nonpartisan races for judges and the superintendent of public instruction, and ballot issues like bond levies or tax initiatives. The Libertarian ballot will have only one contested primary. But that party’s candidates need to get at least 1 percent of the ballots cast in their races to advance to the general election. Candidates for minor parties – Green, Reform, Constitution, Natural Law – are not on the primary ballot but will be on the general election ballot.

Privacy: Under state law, no one is allowed to know which ballot you cast. No records are kept, and the system is being designed to let you pick privately.

Absentee voters must mail their ballots so that the envelopes are postmarked by Election Day. They can also take them to a polling place and drop them off there.

Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday. In many counties, a voter’s precinct poll site is listed on his or her registration card. Spokane polling locations can also be found on the Internet at the County Elections Web site, http://www.spokanecounty.org/elections /Locator.aspx.

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