Here’s what you need to know on Election Day in Central Virginia

It’s Election Day!

Polls opened today at 6 a.m. and will remain open until 7 p.m.

As of Sunday, almost 1.5 million of the more than 6.3 million registered Virginia voters have cast their ballots, according to the Virginia Public Access Project. While that number is high, there still promises to be lots of voting today. 

If you still need to hit the polls — or have friends or colleagues whom you want to help get there — here’s how:

• If you don’t know where your polling place is, registered voters can look it up here.
• If you’re not registered, you can still vote! Here’s where you can find your polling location. Poll workers will register you on the spot. More on that below.
• To see the local and state elections that will appear on your ballot — and learn more about who the candidates are — simply enter your address in the ballot search bar on our Central Virginia Voter Guide and your ballot along with candidate Q&As for each race will pop up.

Voting in Virginia is a fairly straightforward process. Here’s what you need to know:

• Plan to bring your ID. Here’s a list of acceptable ones.
• If you arrive without an ID, most of you can still vote. A poll worker will ask you to sign a form affirming your identity. (I found this training document from the Virginia Department of Elections helpful for understanding the rules.)

Also, you don’t need to be registered to vote in order to vote today. Poll workers will register you in person and give you something called a “provisional ballot” to vote with. That just means that the Registrar’s office will verify you’re eligible to vote before counting your ballot, so your vote may take a little longer to be counted.

Now, the races.

This year all Virginians will be electing a governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general and a member of the state’s House of Delegates. Beyond that, candidates are running for dozens local positions in cities, towns and counties across the commonwealth.

Like previous years, we have created an extensive Voter Guide for Central Virginia, covering 78 races in an 11-county area. Those counties include Albemarle, Appomattox, Buckingham, Cumberland, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa, Madison, Nelson, Orange and Prince Edward, along with the City of Charlottesville and a handful of towns within those counties.

Here’s one example: 

Fred Missel and Scott Smith vie for Samuel Miller District seat on Albemarle County Board of Supervisors

In Albemarle County, two candidates with differing views on immigration enforcement, tax rates and other issues are running for the Samuel Miller District seat on the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors.

Both candidates responded to our Q&A, answering questions we compiled based on the issues you told us you wanted to know about in our annual voter survey.

We followed that format for each local and state contest in central Virginia — so you can see for yourself how your candidates differ on handling issues that matter to you.

We also have Q&As for the state races. Here’s what our two Attorney General hopefuls had to say about the issues central Virginian voters said they care about:

In Virginia’s Attorney General race, candidates vie to be lawyer to the state and have differing opinions on federal intervention

We hope you find this information helpful and forward it to someone else who might use it. 

As the results start coming in — that won’t all happen right away! — we’ll post them on the Voter Guide.

See you at the polls!
Jessie Higgins, Democracy Editor