Politics & Government

Voter Turnout on Track With Official's Predictions

Voters head to the polls to vote for their state delegate in Tuesday's special election.

Residents slowly made their way to the polls in Alexandria on Tuesday morning, voting for their new delegate to represent them from the state's 45th District.

City Hall precinct in Old Town Alexandria had about 145 votes mid-morning, or about 4 percent of the total voting population. About 70 absentee votes also had been tallied, raising the total voters to 6 percent.

Precinct Chief Election Officer Jeff Herre said the turnout was "about what we were expecting."

Find out what's happening in Old Town Alexandriawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Alexandria votes this year are being cast on paper unless a voter requests to vote electronically.

Herre said the city is no longer voting mainly electronically because the state has mandated "a paper trail" of votes. Additionally, the City of Alexandria has a lengthy ballot in November, which made officials concerned that the electronic system may cause voters to "get lost" or "become confused" in navigating the electronic system.

Find out what's happening in Old Town Alexandriawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

City Council candidate Allison Silberberg was campaigning in front of the Agudas Achim synagogue voting place, supporting for state delegate.

"Rob will do well for us in Richmond," said Silberberg. "We need more logic in Richmond."

Krupicka is running against and in this special election, which was called by the governor .

Englin’s resignation went into effect on Friday. His website has since been taken down, with the lone exception of a message announcing Krupicka as the “new state delegate” from the 45th District.

“David Englin no longer represents Virginia's 45th House of Delegates District,” the statement reads. “Your new state delegate is Rob Krupicka, who can be contacted at www.krupicka.com.”

Silberberg added that choosing the election on Sept. 4—the first day of school for many students—"makes it hard on families and we want to make it easier to vote. ... Choosing this day would not have been my choice."

McGhee was also visiting precincts on Tuesday, asking for voter support this morning in front of George Washington Middle School.

In addition to 13 precincts in the City of Alexandria, parts of Arlington and Fairfax counties are also included in the 45th District.

Voting was underway in the Belle Haven and Huntington neighborhoods of southeast Fairfax County Tuesday morning.

“It’s been steady,”  said Stephen Toth, chief elections officer for the Belle View precinct, at 11 a.m. “We’re at 82, and we expect that by the end of the day we’ll be approaching a couple of hundred voters. It’s probably a pretty good turnout for this election.

The timing of the special election and the first day of school might have been fortunate, Toth said. “We’ve got a couple parents that didn’t even know about this who were bringing kids to school today and got to vote,” he said.

Patch editors Rachel Leonard and Drew Hansen contributed to this report.


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