LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — On Election Day, poll workers across Lake County observed a solid voter turnout, with many first-time voters.

Concerns and confusions over mail-in ballots also brought in lots of drop-off and provisional ballots, poll workers said.

Lake County News visited 10 of the county’s 20 polling stations, where many poll workers felt Tuesday’s turnout surpassed that seen in recent years.

“We have more people coming in than we did in the last election,” said poll worker Rhondee Epperson at the Scotts Valley Women’s Clubhouse of the station’s voter turnout in comparison to the 2020 General Election she worked for. “You can see the difference.”

“I’ve worked maybe four or five different elections at this address, and this time it seems about the busiest,” said Eugene Gaffrey, polling station inspector at Lower Lake Methodist Church.

Lake County has the most registered voters this year among all recent elections —with 37,915 registered voters for the 2024 General Election, up from 37,262 in 2020 which had increased from under 35,000 of the 2016 and 2012 elections.

Historical voter turnout has also improved, with 78% in 2020 compared to 72.28% in 2016 and 67.8% in 2012.

So far, 20.99% of ballots in Lake County have been counted for this election, with a final turnout rate estimated around 71% based on currently available data, down from the 2020 election.

This year’s consolidation to 48 precincts from 70 in 2020 may explain some poll workers’ impression of higher turnout.

No official voter turnout data has been released as of the time of publication.

At 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday, one and half an hour before the poll station closed, Gaffrey told Lake County News that there had been a constant and strong turnout throughout the day, among them, a good number of first-time voters.

“We’ve had a good number of new voters, both young and older,” added Gaffrey. “It’s been good to see the enthusiasm to exercise your right to vote.”

Election technician Teresa Johnson at First Lutheran Church Parish Hall found lots of first-time voters coming in. Even her 76-year-old landlord came to vote for the first time, she said.

Kathryn Parankema, clerk at the Community Baptist Church in Nice, showed a woman who had never voted before how to go into the precinct. The turnout of new voters, for her, was “indicative of a level of concern.”

“Today we saw more young people; the primary doesn’t draw them as much,” said Susan Dillard, inspector at the North Shore Christian Fellowship polling station in Upper Lake.

In addition, “We did see an uptick in the native people voting,” Dillard said.

In terms of voter registration, the number of registered voters in both the younger and older age groups in Lake County does not show significant differences from the 2020 election, according to data drawn from state reports. But the actual turnout rate across age groups remains unknown for this year.

Distrust over mail-in ballots

Despite the option to mail in their ballots, many voters opted to hand-deliver completed ballots to polling stations on election day.

The large yellow vote-by-mail drop-off bag was nearly full by late afternoon at the North Shore Christian Fellowship station in Upper Lake, according to clerk Bruce Graves.

Over at the Little Red Schoolhouse that sits in the woods in Cobb, the bag filled even faster, almost reaching capacity by 4 p.m. “As you can tell,” Inspector Cathy Prather said, straining slightly as she lifted the heavy yellow bag, “this is really full now.”

Poll workers said many voters who came to drop off their ballots at the polling stations because they did not trust the mail system or the six official drop boxes. Instead, they preferred the security with staff being there and assisting.

“There’s just a lot of people that like to see the process and come into the polls,” said Diane Allen, inspector at the Lake County Office of Education station in Lakeport, adding that some people “don’t really like the drop boxes because there’s nobody overseeing.”

By 5:30 p.m., the station at Hidden Valley Lake Community Services District Office was on its second yellow bag.

When asked how many ballots would fit in one bag, Inspector Sandy Damitz said, “I have no idea, depends upon how well you stuff it.”

For some stations, drop-offs took the lead. “A lot more dropped the ballot than voted [here],” said Epperson at 1 p.m., who was hand-tracking the numbers with the five-stroke tally marks on her notebook.

Many poll workers, like Graves, also reported large numbers of voters who had “surrendered” their own ballots and requested for a “fresh one” at the polling station. Speaking of the possible reasons behind it, some again attributed it to distrust.

“Still a lot of them want to use our ballots, even though they’re the same thing,” said Epperson. “I don’t know if it’s just from paranoia and that they don’t trust them.”

Lots of verifications and provisionals

The most complicated situation happened when voters wanted a new ballot at the polling station, but walked in without their own ballot to surrender, for which polling staff could not immediately verify if they had already cast their vote.

In this case, the inspector at the station had to call the Registrar of Voters Office to void the ballot before handing the voter a “fresh one,” which was a critical step to protecting the integrity of the election.

“We have to cross-check to make sure people don’t vote twice,” Epperson said.

For Allen, who had been making those calls constantly since the beginning of the day, “That’s been more crazy this election.”

Some voters were not sure about if they had received a ballot through mail, some forgot, while others didn’t want to deal with their mail-in ballots, according to poll workers.

“People are really confused and I don’t know the reason,” said Prather. She also noticed that “they get irritated that they get one and they don’t want one.”

California just became the eighth state in the country to make universal mail-in ballots permanent. In 2021, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law a bill that requires a mail-in ballot be sent to every actively registered voter.

“Many people have adapted and adopted,” said Parankema.

But for her, it’s hard to say if voters are moving to the vote-by-mail ballots. “We have a natural resistance to change,” she said.

Prather showed Lake County News the log of the phone calls to the registrar office she had made throughout the day. Up to 4 p.m., she had called the elections office 209 times and about 30 calls went through.

Like Prather, every other inspector was making these calls.

Richard Adams, inspector at Calpine Geothermal Visitor Center, said at one point he had three to four voters in line waiting for the call to go through to be verified all at once.

If the phone call never went through, the voter could vote provisional, which required an extra step afterwards for election officials to confirm that the voter did not already vote before taking the ballot into account.

But either way, it was guaranteed that “everybody can cast the ballot,” Adams said.

Vote in-person with children

At one point in the Little Red Schoolhouse in Cobb, when Lake County News visited, about four children were hanging around in the polling station, while a few more babies were resting in the arms of their mothers.

Voters liked to bring the whole family, “because everyone wants to get stickers,” said Prather, smiling.

For Raymond and Judy Ruminski, they brought their 16-month-old grandson Lincoln because they needed to take care of the little one while going to vote.

When Raymond Ruminski — who retired in 2018 after serving as Lake County’s Environmental Health director — was filling up his ballot with his right hand at the voting booth, Lincoln was sitting in his left arm, eyes sweeping around the polling station. It’s Lincoln’s first election.

“I like the old-fashioned way, it’s just a tradition,” said Ruminski of why he came to vote in-person. “Plus a lot of these people we know.”

For him, whether the voter ID is required at the poll was not an issue. “I come here and I know the people. I say hi to Bobby,” he added, referring to one of the poll workers. “They know who we are.”

His wife, Judy, liked the permanence of the old-way of going into the precinct. “They’re long-term. They don’t just get up and move,” she said, adding that they had been voting at this location for many years.

The couple voted mostly in similar directions, despite some differences.

“I vote for all the guys that usually don’t win,” Raymond said. Judy chimed in to explain, “This is a Democratic state where you don’t vote Democrats.”

“There’s a lot of things going on now about taking rights away from parents and letting their children do things that are harmful to them,” Judy Ruminski said about why they voted Republican. “So we vote for families.”

Kandee and Greg Stolesen walked into the poll station at Scotts Valley Women’s Clubhouse with their 4-year-old grandson, Sloane.

The couple had already filled up their ballots; it’s mostly for Sloane, who was holding a mini national flag, to slide the ballots into the large yellow drop-off bag. And of course, he got an “I voted” sticker from Rhondee.

“Instead of just putting in the mail, we thought it’d be great to bring him down, let him see the process,” Kandee Stoleson said.

Before coming to the poll, Sloane had voted at an election game at his preschool, for which both sides won the election, Sloane said.

Stoleson said she voted for Democratic candidates Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. “I’m a registered Democrat. But I don’t vote always by the party; I vote for what I believe in,” she said.

For all state propositions and local measures, “we voted ‘no’ on everything except, I think, Proposition 36,” Kandee said.

The family had dropped their votes at 1 p.m. and was heading home. “We’re all hungry; lunch time,” Stoleson said and smiled.

Email staff reporter Lingzi Chen at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. 

Editor/Publisher Elizabeth Larson contributed to this report. Email her at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..