HOLLIDAYSBURG — In Blair County, the number of registered voters for today’s election has swelled to 81,307 and of that number, 15,400 had already voted by mail as of last week — with more ballots expected to arrive through today.

“It’s been a busy election,” Director of Elections Sarah Seymour said last week in her office at the county’s highway yard, which turns into a vote-processing hub starting today.

At 7 a.m., county election workers are slated to begin opening mail ballots and prepping them for the vote-counting process.

While votes from those ballots won’t be uploaded before 8 p.m., the mail votes available by 8 p.m. will be included with in-person votes cast at the county’s 93 precincts — and posted Tuesday night on the county’s website.

Mail votes available after 8 p.m. will become part of updated tallies to be posted as the county election workers carry out round-the-clock counting of mail ballots until the last one is counted.

As for how long that takes, Seymour was optimistic.

“With continuous counting, I’m thinking we might be done sometime Wednesday,” she said cautiously.

Her prediction reflects a difference between 2020 — when the state introduced and promoted vote-by-mail ballots in light of the COVID-19 pandemic — and 2024.

Blair County embraced round-the-clock counting of mail ballots in the November 2022 election, after the state offered election grants to help cover election-related personnel and equipment costs — as long as counties met the state’s requirements, including round-the-clock counting of mail ballots.

While the amount of this year’s mail ballots exceeded expectations, Seymour said she thinks counting should go well based on the experience and personnel.

“I think we’ve got a pretty good system now for counting the ballots and we’ve got a lot of returning personnel who are familiar with what to do,” she said.

In the meantime, if problems surface today at an election precinct, Pennsylvania’s top election official — Secretary of the Commonwealth Al Schmidt — is urging voters to let their local election officials know so it can be addressed. Voters with election-related calls can also call the state hotline, Schmidt said, at 1-877-VOTES-PA.

Seymour said Blair County Solicitor Chris Furman of Pittsburgh will be on site to address any election-related issues. County judges are also on call, if needed.

One of the precinct rules that Blair County has eased, Seymour said, is that voters no longer need to remove campaign pins, stickers, hats or T-shirts while inside their polls. But they are still prohibited, she said, from vocalizing their support for a chosen candidate or campaign issue.

Over the years, those who run the polls have confronted some unhappy voters and forced them to remove campaign buttons and turn T-shirts inside out before being allowed to vote.

While that past practice has caused some arguments, Seymour said this year’s training advised those staffing the polls that voters can wear their campaign items, but they cannot campaign.

“It’s OK as long as they’re not passing out anything in the voting room and they’re not vocalizing who they’re voting for or for who people should vote for,” Seymour said.

Anyone needing assistance with finding a polling place can rely on the county’s website at www.blairco.org. In addition to a listing of all 93 precincts, the county offers access to a web-based system permitting a county resident to enter their residential address which generates the appropriate voting precinct and address.

In addition, the county published a list of all voting precincts on Oct. 29 in the Altoona Mirror. But voters in Frankstown Township’s 5th District should note that they will be voting at the Geeseytown Volunteer Firehall, 215 Mary St., and not the municipal building as listed in the advertisement.

Turnout in today’s election is expected to be high. In the 2020 election when then-former Vice President Joe Biden challenged incumbent President Donald Trump, 79.37% of the county’s voters cast ballots. In 2016 when Trump and Hillary Clinton were vying for the presidency, 72.27% of the county’s 77,834 voters cast ballots.

Of Blair County’s 81,307 voters registered for today’s election, 50,687 are Republicans, 20,009 are Democrats, 377 are Libertarians and 10,228 are registered with other parties or as independents.

In comparison to registration a year ago, for the November 2023 general election, the county has 4,501 more voters than the 76,800 registered at that time. But the 81,307 for today’s election is only 802 more than the 80,499 county voters registered to cast ballots in the 2020 presidential election.