Wearing a mask that reads "VOTE," Ellice Ronsheim, of Grandview Heights, waits in line to cast her ballot during early voting on Monday, Oct. 19, 2020, at the Franklin County Board of Elections Early Voting Center in Columbus, Ohio. Despite steady rain all morning, voters waited for up to 45 minutes to cast their ballot. (Joshua A. Bickel/The Columbus Dispatch via AP)

A secretary of state directive requires all county boards of elections in Ohio to certify final election results by 2 p.m. Nov. 18 — six days earlier than normal.

In the directive, Secretary of State Frank LaRose said the “expedited schedule” is to “account for the possibility of statewide recounts” in the presidential election.

The deadline for Ohio to have its Electoral College delegates vote is Dec. 8, and LaRose’s office has to certify results by Dec. 4.

Until the change, election boards had until Nov. 24 to certify — the standard three weeks after the Nov. 3 election. When Jon Husted was secretary of state in 2016, the last presidential election, he also shortened the certification deadline.

Stephanie Penrose, director of the Trumbull County Board of Elections, said she was “surprised” by LaRose’s decision.

“We’ll have to work all weekend to get it done,” she said. “It puts a little strain on us to get it done in six fewer days, but we’ll make it work.”

Thomas McCabe, deputy director of the Mahoning County Board of Elections, said: “We’ve got to be ready a few days earlier. But the quicker we get it done, the better. We did it four years ago, and we’ll get it done this year too.”

Polls show Ohio is a toss-up state in the presidential race between incumbent Donald Trump, a Republican, and Democrat Joe Biden.

“We’ll have to get through the provisional (ballots) quicker, but we still have 10 days after the election to verify them,” McCabe said.

State Rep. Michele Lepore-Hagan, D-Youngstown, is among Democratic state legislators concerned about the reduction in time, worried if those not finished by 2 p.m. Nov. 18 will have the count cut off without every vote included.

“We demand that county boards of elections be given the time needed to ensure a complete count of votes,” she said.

ABSENTEE BALLOTS

The Mahoning and Trumbull boards are among 16 Ohio counties that had contracted with Midwest Direct, a Cleveland company, to print and mail most of the absentee ballots.

The company quickly became overwhelmed by the increase in requests as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic keeping many people from voting at their polling locations on Nov. 3 and opting to vote early by mail.

The Mahoning board cut its ties with Midwest Direct on Oct. 12, McCabe said, after the company had mailed out most of the requested early votes in the county. The board chose to print the rest in-house.

The board was planning to start the in-house printing next Monday, but ended its contract two weeks early.

“We lost a little confidence in them doing it,” McCabe said. “They had a huge backlog with other counties. They’ve done good for us over the years.”

Mahoning is among nine of the 16 counties in Ohio contracted with Midwest Direct to go in-house, according to LaRose. Voters in some counties were waiting close to two weeks for ballots after they were supposed to be mailed by the company.

Several attempts by this newspaper to contact Richard T. Gebbie, Midwest Direct’s CEO, were unsuccessful.

In a Tuesday statement, Gebbie wrote the company was “up-to-date with all ballot orders as of (Monday) and we anticipate timely fulfillment as we move through the rest of the vote-by-mail process.”

He added: “We brought in extra staff, expanded hours and added equipment to meet the staggering volume of mail-in ballot requests for this election. In many cases, we processed three times the volume of requests the county board of elections anticipated.”

McCabe said Midwest Direct was responsible for sending ballots to voters in Boardman Precinct 4 that were missing the second page. A follow-up ballot with the second page was then sent to those voters, he said.

That precinct is the only one in Mahoning County with two pages as it has multiple local issues and two liquor options that required another page, McCabe said.

There were 238 voters in that Boardman precinct that received a second mailing with the additional page, he said. Voters there can send completed ballots in one or two return envelopes, McCabe said.

TRUMBULL BALLOT ISSUE

The Trumbull board will end its contract next week with Midwest Direct as planned and print the rest of the absentee ballot requests in-house, Penrose said.

The board did the first 10,000 absentee ballots in-house and then had Midwest Direct handle the remaining 30,000-plus, she said.

There was a problem with Midwest, Penrose said, mailing ballots.

More than 16,000 ballots were mailed by Midwest Direct on Oct. 6, the first day early votes could be sent to voters through the mail, but it wasn’t until last Saturday that the remaining ballots were sent by the company, Penrose said.

“There was a gap between the 6th and the 17th,” she said. “Instead, they were processing other counties. It was more than they anticipated, but no one could predict this many people would vote absentee. Everything is current now and it’s back to normal.”

EARLY VOTE TOTALS

As of Wednesday, 41,266 of Trumbull’s 136,928 registered voters had requested ballots by mail. That’s 30.1 percent of registered voters. The county board had received 19,780 of them back as of Wednesday.

Also, 8,753 people have voted in-person at the county’s early voting center.

So far, 36.5 percent of Trumbull’s registered voters have either cast early ballots in-person or requested mail ballots.

In Mahoning County, 50,304 of its 165,383 registered voters had requested ballots by mail as of Wednesday. That’s 30.4 percent of registered voters. The county board had received 21,220 of them as of Wednesday.

Also, 9,012 voters cast ballots at the county’s early voting center.

Between requested mail ballots and those who’ve voted early in-person, that’s 35.9 percent of Mahoning County’s registered voters.

Registered Democrats in Mahoning have in-person and requested absentee ballots by a rate of more than 3 to1 compared with Republicans.

Trumbull County doesn’t keep track of its early voters by political affiliation.

dskolnick@tribtoday.com