LANCASTER, Pa. — The Lancaster County website shows big red letters letting voters know that mail-in ballots that went out came with the wrong instructions. The instructions state that voters should put their ballot into the white secrecy envelope when it should go into the yellow envelope.
According to Lancaster Online, this mistake happened in an effort to minimize those mistakes. County officials made a few changes to the materials that accompany the ballots for the fall municipal election. If voters don’t put the mail-in ballot into the yellow envelope, the vote won’t be counted.
This isn’t the first time an error has occurred in Lancaster County’s election process. In the primary election in April, nearly 19,000 ballots went out to voters that had an error on them. Instead of directing voters to choose two candidates in the race, the ballots incorrectly told them to only vote for one.
In May 2022, about 16,000 mail-in ballots failed to scan because of an incorrect code. Those ballots also had to be counted by hand.
In May 2021, about 12,300 ballots were printed out of order, preventing scanners from reading them. The ballots had to be counted by hand.
Important dates to remember for the upcoming election:
- Last day to register to vote or to update your voter registration before the municipal election
- Oct. 23
- Early in-person voting by mail-in or absentee ballot
- Oct. 10 – 31
- Completed ballots must be received by Election Day
- Nov. 7 at 8:00 p.m.