By Katelyn Seabury
Flagstaff, AZ – About ten years ago, Arizona voters approved a measure that made primary elections "open," in an effort to increase voter turnout.
Lynn Constabile, Yavapai County Elections Director, explains what that means.
ACT: If you're a registered Republican, Democrat, Libertarian or Green party you'll get the ballot for your party. If you're registered as any other party, non-partisan or an independent you'll get to choose from a democrat, republican or green party ballot. Libertarians have a closed primary, but the other three are open to all the other parties.
That's important, since nearly one million Arizonans -about one-third of the electorate are not a member of a political party
Many people are also voting early by mail. Yavapai County mailed out over 48,000 ballots and received almost half of them back. Coconino County mailed out over 12,000 ballots and received about 40 percent of them back.
Both counties have seen an increase in early voting since the permanent early voting list was created two years ago.
For Arizona Public Radio, I'm Katelyn Seabury