Early voting begins in final week of Saskatchewan election campaign

REGINA — Saskatchewan residents can vote early for five days starting Tuesday in the lead-up to the Oct. 28 provincial election.

Chief electoral officer Michael Boda says “Voting Week” is meant to make it convenient for eligible voters to cast their ballots early.

“I think the fundamental reason here for creating Voting Week has been to broaden access to voters across the province,” Boda said.

“Going back to 1905, there was one geographical location on one day for a minimal number of hours where people had to go vote. And what we’ve been doing is expanding that over the last three cycles so that people have more options available to them, more hours available to them, and that there are more convenient locations.”

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He says there are more than 880 voting locations spread across 61 ridings, open nine hours per day for the first five days and for 11 hours on election day.

“We’ve made every effort to ensure that voting locations are accessible and convenient for any voter who chooses to access them,” Boda said.

“As well, we’ve extended the time for voting so that voters can come from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. on the first five days of voting, and then on that last day it’s 9 a.m. to 8 p.m.”

Hey says more than 32,000 voters have chosen to cast their ballots by mail, down from the last election held in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“In 2020, over 56,000 voters chose to vote by mail, and this time it’s 32,405, which is a little bit less than during the pandemic election. We had anticipated that, but that is excellent, excellent pickup for us in terms of broadening access to people that are out there,” said Boda.

The deadline for mail-in applications was October 19.

Boda says Elections Saskatchewan will also have mobile polls open at personal care homes for residents who aren’t able to leave their facilities.

He says there are about 810,000 registered voters in Saskatchewan.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 21, 2024.

–with files from 980 CJME’s Roman Hayter