For thousands of U students and surrounding community members, the only thing left to do in this year’s election is wait for the results next week.
Associated Students of the University of Utah Government Relations Board Director Andrew Jensen said about 700 people each day have cast early ballots at the voting station in the Union since Oct. 218212;bringing the total to about 4,200 voters.
Jensen said the U has been one of the two most popular early voting locations operating in Salt Lake County. It is tied with the station at the Murray City Hall for total number of voters coming to beat the large crowds expected on Election Day.
“We were expecting a huge number of people here and we’re not disappointed in the least,” he said.
Lauren Brown, a senior in political science, waited in line about 10 minutes to cast an early vote for Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.
“I don’t even know where my polling station is8212;this is my first time voting,” she said. “It’s very convenient.”
Jensen said about 60 percent of those coming to the Union polling location are U students and 40 percent are other county residents, primarily from the communities surrounding the U.
The number of non-students voting early has created more work for the organizers, who have had to scramble to get parking validations for them all.
“We drastically underestimated that part,” Jensen said. “We had no idea how many we were going to need.”
The biggest crowds have been showing up at lunchtime between noon and 2 p.m. Jensen said some voters have spent up to an hour in line during that time of day.
“That’s the time, I think, that everyone wants to do it because they see our signs up as they go into the cafeteria,” he said.
Brandon Beifuss, a freshman studying economics, said he found out about the early voting station from signs posted around campus.
“I wanted to come down and vote on my own time,” Beifuss said. “I wanted to get it over with and I didn’t wanted to wait in line on the 4th.”
Freshman biology major Wendy Vu said voting on campus saved her time traveling to her polling station in Taylorsville.
“I figured the lines would be a lot longer on the 4th and I don’t want to go back home to vote because I live on campus,” Vu said.
Jensen said he attributed the large turnout to the efforts of ASUU and the U’s VoteProject organization to make sure everyone was aware of early voting on campus. An e-mail reminder was sent to about 30,000 students, faculty and staff during the week before the polling station opened.
VoteProject Director Thomas Jarvis said he has been doing everything he can to make sure people know what is going on and where they should go.
“We did a lot of pushing for it during our voter registration campaign so I’m happy a lot of students are taking advantage of it,” he said.
Early voting at the U will continue until Friday, Oct. 31 at 5 p.m. Anyone registered to vote in Salt Lake County can come in on any afternoon until then and use one of the 13 touch-screen voting machines available.
Early voting is a trend that has become popular nationwide during the past two election cycles as state and county election officials try to find ways to get more eligible voters to the polls. All counties in Utah are offering early voting this year and initial indications show a record number of voters will participate.
Ryan Shelton contributed to this report.
Erik DaenitzAn estimated 700 voters have turned out daily for early voting at the University, 60 percent of those voters have been U students.