Prepaid Ballots Required Planning by County Auditors

Included with those primary ballots arriving in people's mailboxes over the next few days will be prepaid envelopes to mail them back free of charge. Douglas County Auditor Thad Duvall says they had to go back to the drawing board.

"We needed to examine all of our ballot mailing materials and make sure that we removed all references to needing to use postage to return the ballot. We got all that edited out and reprinted our incoming envelopes so that they would be postage paid. It's all done and ready to go."

Duvall says the costs were about what they expected when it came to doing all the work. The mail will be covered by the state's bulk permit, but anyone who uses the drop boxes won't incur that charge.

Duvall says all the work they did this summer will make the general election in November easier.

"We have all that in place and our postage permits are secured so we're ready to go."

Duvall said he expects the primary ballots to go out in the mail Wednesday and they could be in mailboxes by Thursday or Friday.