Kane County Clerk Quells Election Fears, Sets Drop Box Locations
KANE COUNTY, IL — Kane County’s top election official said last week he has no doubts about the U.S. Postal Service’s ability to handle what could be a record number of mail-in ballots for the Nov. 3 election.
Clerk John Cunningham said he has “complete confidence” in the postal service despite many lawmakers, including Democratic U.S. Reps. Bill Foster, Lauren Underwood and Sean Casten, voicing concerns about how it will cope with the expected spike in mail-in ballots due to the coronavirus pandemic.
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“People in the postal service are saying this (the 2020 general election) shouldn’t be any worse than income-tax time or … Christmastime,” Cunningham said during a forum with election officials from Aurora’s four counties. “It’s been politically overblown and it should not have been.”
Kane County will install three drop boxes for voters to submit their ballots directly to election officials, Cunningham said. Drop boxes will be located at the Kane County Clerk’s Office in Geneva, the clerk’s Aurora Satellite Office and Elgin City Hall.
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Mail-in ballots will be sent to voters who requested them starting Sept. 24, Cunningham said.
Some counties are installing dozens of drop boxes to make it easier for voters to cast their ballots amid the pandemic, but Cunningham said he believes Kane County has “plenty of them,” noting ballots can be placed in any of more than 4,000 public mailboxes throughout the county.
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Voters can also place ballots in their personal mailboxes, but ballots must be postmarked by Nov. 3 to be counted. Cunningham urged those who are voting by mail to submit their ballots before Nov. 3 to ensure they are postmarked in time.
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Cunningham said he does not think it would be secure to keep ballot drop boxes on the street, adding all three in Kane County will be inside and monitored by a surveillance camera.
“It’s important that the security of those ballots are kept,” Cunningham said.
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This article originally appeared on the Aurora Patch
