The American flag at Gospel Hill was raised Monday after recent pole painting and repair. Election polls are open in Blair County from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. today. Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski

HOLLIDAYSBURG — Blair County will be among the majority of Pennsylvania counties beginning today with an uninterrupted counting of ballots.

The county’s unofficial vote totals, posted incrementally — usually starting after 9 p.m. — on the county’s website at www.blairco.org, will include votes cast today at the precincts and votes from mailed ballots processed by 7 p.m., according to county Director of Elections Sarah Seymour.

Additional votes from mailed ballots, collected as the vote counting process stretches into and beyond Wednesday’s early morning hours, will be used to update the county’s vote totals on Wednesday.

If the vote counting continues into Thursday, then totals are to be updated again.

The uninterrupted vote counting was something the county board of elections — made up of county commissioners Amy Webster, Bruce Erb and Laura Burke — agreed to in late September. The state included that vote counting requirement as a condition for the county’s acceptance of $398,914 from Act 88 of 2022 to cover election-related expenses.

For today’s election, Blair County has 78,252 registered voters, which includes 47,850 Republicans, 20,561 Democrats and 9,821 who are affiliated with another party or have no affiliation.

The total is slightly higher than the 77,464 county voters who were registered for the spring primary but lower

than the 88,499 registered two years ago, when the U.S. presidency was up for grabs between incumbent Donald Trump and challenger Joe Biden.

Four years ago, in 2018, when ballots contained the same races as they contain today — including governor and senator — Blair County’s voter turnout was slightly under 58 percent, with 44,063 of the county’s 75,996 registered voters casting ballots.

Another factor that may or may not play a role in how soon the votes are counted is what happens to “undated ballots” that the state Supreme Court recently directed county election boards to segregate and preserve.

Blair County Elections Board solicitor Nathan Karn, in response to that ruling, filed a petition with the state Supreme Court, seeking clarification of its order, a request that the court denied Monday.

Karn pointed out the high court’s directive addressed mailed ballots dated as early as Sept. 19. But in Blair County, the mail-in and/or absentee ballots became available for pickup on Oct. 12 while others were mailed on Oct. 14.

Karn made the argument in his request for clarification that if a ballot arrived in Blair County with a Sept. 19 date, then the high court’s means it should be counted “despite the fact that the (Blair County) voter could not have received the ballot until Oct. 12 at the very earliest.

While Karn offered some alternative language for the high court to consider, the state and national Democratic committees objected and filed a response with the court, claiming changes at this time would “sow chaos and inject confusion” in the evaluation of mailed ballots.

Mirror Staff Writer Kay Stephens is at 814-946-7456.