BOISE, Idaho — The August 25 election is right around the corner.
While it may not have as many ballot items as the May primary or the November general election, there are some important issues for Idaho voters to keep an eye on.
In Ada County, there is only one item on August ballots: a supplemental levy for the West Ada School District.
The district is asking voters to approve a $14 million dollar, two-year levy. The cost to taxpayers is about $52 annually per $100,000 of taxable property.
"The funding for this levy is used for our general operations," said Char Jackson, spokesperson for the West Ada School District. "So what that means is it supports salaries and positions - that's 85% of our costs here."
This will be the second time the levy renewal is on the ballot after it failed to get enough votes in May.
Another levy renewal is up for vote in the Middleton School District. School officials are hoping the third time's the charm, as voters have previously rejected the levy twice.
The funding request is a two-year, $1.5 million supplemental levy. According to the district, it would be used to help reduce the impacts from the 5% budget cuts ordered by the state.
Other school districts, such as the Jerome Joint School District and Cambridge School District, also have school levies on the ballot.
When it comes to actually voting on those items, what will that look like amid the pandemic?
Joe Decker, public information officer for Canyon County, said it will look fairly similar to past elections.
"We're going to do both mail-in and absentee," he said. "We're going to have five polling locations open."
But those locations will have added safety precautions in place for voters.
"What's that's going to look like is there's only going to be a certain amount of voters allowed in," Decker said. "They're going to do their voting. Once those voters are out, we're going to sanitize everything and then let the next round of voters in."
The Ada County Clerk's Office tells KTVB it will also have both in-person and absentee voting options, with 70 polling locations open.
Both counties expect a high number of absentee ballots for this election.
"They were given the option for the May primary to check off boxes for August and November," said Canyon County Clerk Chris Yamamoto. "A lot of voters did so we already know that's up."
So far, the Canyon County Elections Office has had more than 3,500 absentee ballot requests, while Ada County has had more than 40,000.
Yamamoto said one challenge they have seen with the August election is finding enough poll workers. Concerns over COVID-19 have left many unwilling to volunteer.
Poll workers are typically older and are therefore more susceptible to the virus.
"For this August election, we actually sent out over 400 emails to our existing poll workers," Yamamoto said. "We had 22 positive responses."
After some additional work, Yamamoto said they were able to get enough workers to cover the five polls that will be open for the August election. However, having enough workers will likely be a big concern come November.
In fact, Yamamoto said it's something he's already working with the state to try and address.
Early voting begins Aug. 10. Voters have until 5 p.m. on Aug. 14 to request an absentee ballot.
All ballots must be returned by 8 p.m. on Aug. 25.
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