HEAVY TASK ON POLLING DAY

Southland Times, Issue 23502, 7 May 1938, Page 6

HEAVY TASK ON POLLING DAY

Four Issues Before Electors, record enrolments IN CITY With a greatly increased number of electors on the municipal roll and the largest number of candidates for election to the Invercargill City Council for many years, the staff engaged by the city returning officer (Mr W. J. Sturman) expects a very busy day on polling day next Wednesday. Thirty deputy returning officers and a similar number of poll clerks have been engaged for the hours of voting and this staff will be reinforced by. others for the counting of votes after the poll closes at seven o’clock in the evening. There will be approximately 20 separate voting places in the city with several booths in each of the most important centres. At the Town Hall there will be five separate deputy returning officers in charge of the voting. There will be a booth in the City Council chambers on the ground floor and it is desired by Mr Sturman that this should be reserved particularly for elderly electors who do not wish to climb the stairs to Victoria Hall where more accommodation will be provided. 1 There are 14,500 names on the mam and supplementary rolls compared with 13,180 fo_- the 1935 election. There are already indications of keen interest among the electors and with a mayoral contest this year it is expected that a bigger percentage of the electors will The electors will each receive four ballet papers covering the mayoral, City Council, Hospital Board and Harboard Board elections and voting will be no easy task as 12 councillors are to be selected from 30 candidates. As has been stated on a “ticket” distributed among householders, it is legal to vote for less than the required number of candidates, but most electors prefer to exercise their full franchise. Immediately after the closing of the poll at seven o’clock, additional poll clerks engaged by the returning officer will come on duty to assist with the counting of votes. The team engaged at each booth will be reinforced to four, and two men will concentrate on the laborious task of counting the votes of council candidates, while the others handle the other three issues. It is expected that the name of the city’s next Mayor will be known soon after eight o’clock and the other returns will come through later. Because of the difficulty in counting the votes for the 30 council candidates the result of this poll cannot be expected until late at night. The returning officer requests electors to record their votes early on election day where possible to avoid congestion at the booths at the closing hour.