Poll workers in Will County reported seeing “pretty good” turnout numbers on Election Day afternoon, noting that high turnout is not expected during primary elections.

“It’s been higher than we thought it was going to be,” said an election judge working at the Village of Homer Glen. “It started very slow this morning, but for a primary it’s been decent.”

Republican and Democrat candidates seeking their party nominations for Will County sheriff, three County Board seats as well as congressional races, Dick Durbin’s U.S. Senate seat, and the Illinois governor were among the races on the ballot.

According to data from the Will County Clerk’s office, as of 7 p.m. on Monday, 16,466 early ballots had been cast in-person, with another 4,087 mail-in ballots being deposited in the county drop boxes.

Mail-in ballots needed to be postmarked by Tuesday in order to count and will not all be tallied for several days after the election.

There are 458,788 officially registered voters in Will County.

Election judges in multiple precincts noted that due to the expansion of mail-in and early voting, Election Day turnout has dropped.

“So far it’s been pretty good, I would think,” said an election judge who asked not to be named at Homer Precinct 16 at the Lockport Police station. “It’s been slow but steady.”

“It’s been pretty slow for us,” said Cris, an election judge at Lockport Precinct 17, located at the Lockport Township building, who didn’t want her last name used. “We’ve had 132 ballots cast already and we have about four hours left. In November, we’ll be absolutely swamped, but it’s a primary, so it’s slower. Everyone has been very nice and patient today though.”

Cris observed that the two precincts located at the office dealt with some confusion from out-of-precinct voters coming in, and needing to be redirected.

“They had early voting here, so we’ve had a lot of people come in lost, because they didn’t read their voter registration cards carefully or they don’t understand that even though they can vote anywhere early, they have to vote in their precinct on election day,” Cris said.

Poll workers in DuPage Precinct 35, located in the Romeoville Village Hall, said they observed the same thing.

“We’ve had steady traffic,” said election judge Terry, who would not give their last name. “But I think we’ve redirected more people than we’ve had actually vote because this is an early vote location, but they’ve all been nice about it.”

Cris said the only discouraging thing about the early voting site misunderstandings is that it may discourage some people from following through with voting.

“We had one man come in here, and we told him he needed to be voting at another precinct and he sighed and said ‘it’s not worth it,’ which is sad,” she said. “Which we don’t like to see.”

Homer Precinct 18, the second precinct located at the Lockport Township office, had also seen over 100 voters by mid-afternoon, with election judges anticipating a surge after 5 p.m.

“It’s been good, but a little slow,” the poll workers noted.

“Usually the primary is slower, but it will get busier after people get off work at 5,” said one judge. “Everyone who has come in has been very appreciative and friendly. I’ve had several people tell me they’ve been voting every election since they were 18, including one woman in her 90s, and we’ve had several college students on spring break come in with their parents.”

“It’s been a nice easy day,” said Ciara, an election judge at Joliet Precinct 17 at Our Savior Lutheran Church in Joliet. “We had a bit of a rush in the early afternoon, and we’re definitely expecting another one between 5 and 6:30 (p.m.)”

While most precincts saw fairly low turnout throughout election day, with Troy Precinct 19 reporting only 90 out of 1,871 registered voters coming in by 5 p.m. on Tuesday, over 20,000 people in the county had already voted before the prior to Election Day.