SPOKANE, Wash. — Unofficial results for Spokane County's 2019 general election show a voter turnout of more than 35%, a number predicted by county elections staff on Monday.
Voters are helping to decide a number of races, including Spokane mayor, city council president, and various state and local measures.
As of Monday, Spokane County Elections staff had received roughly 90,000 ballots for the 2019 general election. That number jumped to 118,541, or 35.86%, of registered voters at about 7 p.m. on election night.
There are currently 330,579 people who are registered to vote in Spokane County, records show.
The next ballot count will come out on Wednesday, Nov. 6 at 6 p.m. Elections staff estimate that there are still about 34,000 ballots left to count.
The election will not be made official until Nov. 26, with additional ballot counts happening until that date.
2019 voter turnout among City of Spokane, Spokane Valley
More than 53,000, or 38.15%, of voters registered in the City of Spokane returned their ballots.
District Two, which encompasses the South Hill, is seeing the highest turnout, as is often the case. Nearly 43% of registered voters within the district returned their ballots.
In Spokane Valley, 17,848, or 28.4% percent, of registered voters returned ballots.
Past voter turnout
Voter turnout for Spokane County Primary in August sat at about 34.41 percent.
The average turnout for all general elections since 2012 is about 57.82 percent.
During the 2018 general election, more than 72% of registered voters countywide returned their ballots.
This number was one of the highest return rates in recent years. According to county election records, there were more than 70% of ballots returned for the 2010, 2012 and 2016 elections.
Some significant races caused a boost in voter turnout over the years. During the 2016 presidential race between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, about 76.5% of Spokane County voters returned ballots.
In 2012, decisions on congressional races, Washington's governor, and whether to legalize marijuana and same-sex marriage led to a boost in voter turnout.
Rare level of interest in 2019 general election
Though a voter turnout of 35% may not seem like a particularly impressive stat in its own right, elections office staff say they saw a rare level of interest for a year with only local candidates on the ballot.
In fact, with more than $1 million spent on the mayor's race alone and all of the ads that go with that, many people who could not even vote on the office were engaged.
"Even people that live in the county and not in the city [are] calling, [saying], 'I want to vote for the mayor,'" Spokane County Elections Manager Mike McLaughlin said on Monday.