Floridians are casting final votes on this year’s gubernatorial election tonight. Southwest Florida saw some high absentee and early voting numbers ahead of the polls closing.
Compared to long lines and frustration during 2012, this election has been going smoothly in Southwest Florida.
Lee and Collier counties are not experiencing wait times that are minutes or hours-long. Many voters cast their ballots ahead of Election Day.
Spokeswoman for Collier County’s Supervisor of Elections Trish Robertson said about 11,000 more people voted by mail this year in Collier County compared to 2010. She said so far there have also been about 25 hundred more early voters.
“So as of right now it looks like we already have in combination of all methods of voting, we already have a turnout of 50.55 percent,” said Robertson.
Robertson said her office hoped to see a turnout closer to 60 percent by the time the polls close. In 2010, Collier County had 57.8 percent voter turnout.
Lee County hopes to have the same turnout. So far, the county has about two thousand more early voters compared to 2010. Lee County elections spokeswoman Vicki Collins said the county is really standing out when it comes to voting by mail though.
“Our absentee turnout has been phenomenal,” said Collins. “We actually have had over 102,000 ballots returned. That’s almost 10 almost 12 thousand more than we have received back for the presidential election.”
Polls close at 7pm this evening.
